


The Summoning

by Guardian_Rex



Series: It Started on a Tuesday [1]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Gen, I have OCs here, Minor Character Death, Occult things included, Summoning Au, danny is smarter than the show makes him seem, first fic, i'll add tags as i go, that is an oc who dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-21
Updated: 2016-08-30
Packaged: 2018-04-22 17:46:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 27
Words: 113,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4844696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guardian_Rex/pseuds/Guardian_Rex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny Phantom was the talk of the town, and especially the school, Casper High. But, no one's ever really talked to Phantom, have they? since they don't feel like charging into a ghost fight to ask about the hero's favorite color, two students look for a way to talk to him, and they find it, much to Danny's confusion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Summoning fun

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic, and the first fic of an Au I'm proud to be the founder of, so please be nice in the comments, or at least gentle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I edited this chapter and decided to start with posting the edits here on ao3

White chalk lined the floor, as far from the Impala as possible and most everything else pushed to the side. Wax candles were lit at eight points, like a compass, and two teens with matching faces stood at the edge of the circle. One was scrutinizing it critically, looking for any errors that he might have made, while the other looked through a textbook, eyes moving back and forth over the same lines several times. The one holding the book heaved a sigh and took another step back, feeling skeptical. "Georgy, are you sure this is gonna work? I was joking about the whole 'summon a ghost' thing, ya know."

"Yeah, Ricky, I'm sure." The one with glasses rolled his eyes, nodding both to the question and in satisfaction that he had gotten the circle perfectly. "I figured out how to summon that Box Ghost dude, I can figure out how to summon Danny Phantom."

"I'm sorry, did you say you summoned a ghost while I wasn't there?" George shrugged and continued to meticulously make sure he got the curve of the P just right. "What did you even put down to summon him?"

"I drew a square in a circle and put a box on the circle before I tried. It worked, he stole the box and left." George turned to his twin and flashed him a grin. "The box may have had a confetti bomb in it."

Chuckling at his brother's complete disregard for the possible wrath of a spirit - even a weak one like Box Ghost - Rick looked over the simple circle. Phantom's symbol was in the center, with a crown on the side and a snowflake on the other. "Ok, I get the ice cause I've seen him use it before, but the crown? How do we know that he became king when he beat that other king ghost? The other ghosts still attack."

"Yeah well, maybe he became king and just doesn't know it yet? I dunno man, it just seems like it'd fit." George shrugged and pulled out a knife that he had made sure to sterilize over one of the candles before pricking his finger. "Got the chant ready?"

Rick gave a thumbs up, bouncing on his heels. If this worked, they would get to meet the town's superhero! How could he not at least try, even if the last three failed? "Go with the blood." George nodded, and a drop of crimson met the concrete, then another before he cleaned his finger and got a band-aid. Rick meanwhile started chanting in the most dramatic voice theater class could teach him. "Magna heroicarum gelidus regem appellem mihi nomen tuum: Phantom!"

Nothing. Rick's face fell, and he closed his Latin textbook, ready to call it quits when the electric lights above them flickered out. The only light now was coming from the candles, but it wasn't the golden yellow of normal flame. Four green and four icy blue flames danced at the edges of the glowing white chalk, a bitter wind blowing out and chilling the twins to the bone. A sharp snap sounded, and a halo of white appeared a couple of feet off of the ground, lighting up the boy's faces with excitement. The halo split in two, revealing a monochromic hazmat suit and the snow-haired teen frequently seen wearing it.

For a moment, no one moved. Green eyes full of confusion flicked between awestruck blue before Danny coughed into his fist and waved, the otherworldly echo that came with his ghost form seemingly magnified by more than just their closed in location. "Um, hi?" The only response that got was a sharp gasp from the kid with the highlights - which helped Danny to notice that neither of them had been breathing until just then, so he pressed on. "I'm uh, honored to be here, really, but could one of you tell me where here is and how it is I got here?"

The hero floated a bit out of the circle and was slightly surprised when he was held back by something. It wasn't strong enough to keep him there if he tried to push it away, but it was there, and it was worrisome. Rick recovered from his shock, mostly, first and shook his brother excitedly. "George, George look we did it! We summoned him!" He pointed at the confused ghost and bounced on the balls of his feet. "We summoned you, it worked!"

Danny opened his mouth but the other kid - George apparently - beat him to it. "Oh my gosh, it actually worked! Hi, George Pate, my brother Rick and I are freshmen at Casper High, and we wanted to meet you really bad,"

"But we couldn't do that when a ghost attack was happening cause we don't wanna become ghosts ourselves," Rick picked up and Danny resisted the urge to say TV wasn't kidding about twins. "So I got to thinking of ways to meet you since you never appear any other time."

"And he said something about satanic summoning rituals-"

"Which was a joke, we've never tried to summon the devil."

"-so I started looking into it, and I tested my little theory that ghosts can be summoned with circles!" At this point, Danny looked down and saw that there was indeed a nigh perfectly drawn circle with his DP symbol, a crown and a snowflake in and around it. "And I got the candles and everything!"

"I bought and lit them," Rick interjected with a grin. "I also came up with like three different chants to see if they would bring you here. This is the fourth time we tried, and it finally worked!"

Danny wasn't sure what to make of any of this. Trying to wrap his head around the fact that a drawing, some candles, and words forced him into ghost form and teleported him away from his friends, was proving a bit difficult. But he could practically see stars in the eyes of both of them, so he decided to be nice. "Look, guys, again, I'm flattered, but I do kinda have things to do. I might see you another time, but for now, could you undo whatever it is you did?"

The twins blinked at that, and George looked over at his brother expectantly, since he didn't think of a way to send Phantom back. The Box Ghost had just left on his own. Thankfully, Rick was prepared for this sort of thing and had looked into how to end the summoning if nothing special was going to happen. "As we have nothing to offer you, we release you from this circle and send you back to where you came from." He swept a hand through the air, and the glow of the chalk faded away. There was another flash of light, the same as when he had entered, and Phantom disappeared, the wind blowing out the candles all at once.

Once he was gone, and several minutes passed, the boys looked at each other with wide gaping smiles and George half shrieked, "Tell me you got that on camera!" His brother ran over to the counter their dad had put in the garage and held up the camera that was still recording, and found himself with a couple armfuls of excited George. "Yes! That was Awesome! We did it!"

"We gotta tell everybody, we gotta show everybody at school, dude this is incredible!" Rick saved the file and handed it to his brother. "Put that everywhere that's secure, so we never lose it cause that's goin everywhere!"

* * *

 

Tucker had his PDA out and ready, the app he had developed to ping the city for Danny's ecto signature running. Sam was checking over the weapons in her pack when a flash of light filled the room. Danny reappeared over the bed and sat there in the air, dazed and shaking his head to clear it of his confusion. Tucker put down Sharon and Sam her weapons, both tackling Danny to the bed with simultaneous cries of his name.

"Danny, where did you go and what happened?" Sam stared at her half dead friend with a face full of seriousness. "We were about to go out, track you down, and blast the face off of whoever took you."

"Itis good to see that more than my phans appreciate me," he chuckled and transformed back into his human half, a green, long-sleeved button-up and denim jeans replacing his black and white hazmat suit. "But murdering freshman is going into Dash threat territory, doncha think?"

"Did you meet some necromancers or somethin, dude?" Tucker raised a brow with a grin, about as serious as ever. "Cause that would be both really cool and really really bad." He tilted his head and hummed. "Though, I bet I could make some merch based off of them if I get a look."

Danny shook his head and spread out his limbs. "Nah, I don't think they were necromancers. Besides, that's Sam's job." He grinned and winced when punched in the arm, the goth's grin a welcome indicator that he wasn't in too much trouble. "They said they had thought summoning me to get a conversation was a good idea. I have to admit; that's pretty creative at least."

"So you got fans so into you they went to magic to chat?" There was that emphasis on magic that said the tech-savvy teen wasn't too keen on believing that it worked, even though Danny's disappearance would have been proof enough for most.

"Did you get a look at the things they used to summon you? That could be useful to remember." Sam gave Tucker a look and he prepared to take down notes on whatever Danny said was used, knowing the write-it-down-or-karma-will-get-you look for what it was.

"Uh, they had a bunch of candles all in a circle, there was a drawing on the ground under me." The halfa crossed his legs on the bed, trying to remember what he saw as accurately as possible even though he only looked once. "There was my DP in the middle, a snowflake to the side and what looked like it could have been a crown on the other side and all of them were in circles inside a bigger circle, and it was all done in chalk. One of them said something about Latin."

"Yup sounds like your standard summoning circle," the goth sighed at the thought of people having her friend pop up at random times before a thought occurred to her. "Although, I'm pretty sure that yours would have more to it than that."

"Would a circle like that have some kind of hold on what it brings to it?" Danny raised a brow at Tucker, who was searching for things on the occult now. Just because he didn't fully believe in magic didn't mean he couldn't look things up and be prepared.

"I guess?" The lanky teen shrugged and leaned back on his elbows. "I tried floating away from it, and it felt like there was some kind of wall made of saran wrap keeping me there." He frowned, flicking a hand toward the ceiling and bringing tiny sparks of ectoplasm to float around. "It was an annoying feeling."

"Sounds like the circle was binding you to the spot. How did you get back here? It might have had something to do with the ritual." Deciding it was best to start from the beginning, Danny went over the whole conversation from when he got there in the garage to the return. When he finished, Sam nodded in thought. "Sounds to me like the circle kept you there and let you take the same route back. If it happens again-"

"When it happens again," Tucker cut in with his usual peppy pessimism. "They were freshmen Sam, they're gonna spread this on the internet by tomorrow." Danny groaned, covering his eyes with an arm, and Sam sighed in concession.

"When it happens," she amended with a pointed look directed to Tucker, " you should keep in mind that you'll have to either get them to send you back or be prepared to fly out and back home."

"Great," the raven haired teen sighed and shook his head. "Another chunk of my time about to be taken away by the town. Can we get back to my music lessons?" It was a wonder his parents let him get a guitar in the first place, he wasn't going to let this stop him just yet.


	2. Wednesday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where there is latin, the twins feel accomplished and Danny is just done with it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Greetings and Beaunvenue dear readers!

The next day at school the first thing that the trio noticed was that a particular set of twins was getting everyone's attention in the halls. A certain queen bee and quarterback decided that it was the perfect time to assert themselves to the front of the crowd and demand answers as the next thing any of them heard was Dash's voice. "Hey, what's goin on? Why is everyone around you two and not us?" He shoved his finger into the glasses wearing one's chest, Rick, Danny remembered, and was surprised by the near threatening glare he received for it. Paulina, unfazed by the glare, turned her attention to George.

"Care to explain what the apparent hottest gossip is boys?" Rick refused to unpin his glare from Dash's face, the two having a sort of dominance staring contest but George lit up at the more civil approach and pulled out their camera, his next words catching both A-lister's attention instantly.

"Rick and I talked to Phantom last night!" Dash grudgingly tore his gaze away, giving up the win just this once so that he could pay full attention to the other geek. "We got it on camera and everything! We were thinking up ways to contact him without, ya know, being in mortal danger, and we figured out a way to summon him!"

"Summon him," Paulina parroted back as she let herself digest that. These two dorks found a way to get her precious Ghost boy to come to them when she hadn't? "How?"

"It's all on this camera right-" George was cut off by the bell ringing sharply in everyone's ears and the crowd started to disperse disappointedly.

"No problem folks, we can show you the video at lunch, and we're going to be uploading it to our website in class!" While Rick advertized Danny Tucker and Sam slammed their locker doors shut, paler than usual, which was saying something in Danny's case.

"This is going to be fun," Sam grumbled sarcastically as they all headed toward their first period History class. "If that video gets out then everyone in Casper High will be summoning you by this afternoon Danny!"

"I know, but maybe we can get rid of the video? Stop them from spreading proof that it works so that no one else tries it out?" Here they turned to Tucker, who was already getting to work on his PDA, going through the website to find access to the camera.

"I'm working on getting into the camera as we speak, good thing it's internet enabled." By the time they were in their class, which thankfully excluded a certain quarterback, Tucker was in and erasing the video. "That should be done in a few minutes, and they won't know until they try and show it to everyone."

"Nice job Tuck!" With a grin on their faces, the boys fist-bumped and Sam gave him a playful punch to the shoulder. "So Sam, what did you find on the summoning stuff?" The Goth grinned wider than the boys had. Sam pulled out one of her older books that made her glad she was rich so that she could outbid anyone when it came to getting what she needed for the team. It also made for great light reading before bed had it not been important.

By the time lunch rolled around Danny was trying to figure out what exactly his circle would look like done the right way. According to Sam, the hold the twin's circle had on him was weak because it wasn't the best version. "If the symbols on the circle have to have something to do with things connected to what you're summoning then yours would have to have something to do with the two of us, and of course Jazz. I figure a book would represent Jazz pretty well, since if she's not over analyzing everything you say and do, she's got her nose buried in a book."

Danny nodded with a grin and tilted his head. "A rose to represent Sam's love of plants -"

"A thorned rose, yes."Sam nodded in approval along with her interruption.

"And me?" Tuck raised a brow as he looked up from his PDA and food. "What, oh wise ghost boy, would represent me in your little circle of family?" The meat lover rolled his eyes at the way Sam's face scrunched up in disgust with how he spoke with food in his mouth. Danny didn't finish thinking about it until Tucker had finished his food, though that wasn't very much time.

"A motherboard, maybe?" The technogeek raised a brow at him, and Danny shrugged. "It'd be easy to draw in chalk, and it's a critical part of the computer that few think about because it's doing its job instead of broadcasting what that job is. I haven't heard you brag about your skills in programming and math since seventh grade, yet you managed to make Cs in our freshman year, and now you can keep up with a solid B- in math and science."

Tucker took a moment to grin down at his PDA and puff out his chest. "Well, I can't deny the truth when it comes to you guys, can I?" Once his preening ended, he gave Danny another look, amusement twinkling in his eyes when the raven haired teen gave a slight flailing of his arms. "I feel, however, that a screwdriver is more appropriate."

"Maybe Danny can try drawing what he feels would be the best version?" Sam dug into her backpack, pulling out a pencil and pad of drawing paper. "Maybe tap into those instincts of yours for the answer?"

"That'll have to wait till after we see the looks on the twins faces," Danny pointed at the next table over with his spork before shoveling some mashed potatoes into his mouth. The table in question was swarmed with near every student in the lunch block. At the center of the crowd were the Pate twins, soaking in the attention.

Everyone was gathered around them, especially Paulina, Dash and - to Sam's dismay - Valerie. The camera was turned on and opened up, the cafeteria eerily quiet as the device was turned up as loud as George would dare risk his speakers, and static filled the air. This was quickly followed by a collective groan from the student body and three sighs of relief. Tucker and Danny exchanged high-fives and grins. "Never mess with Fenton and Foley, you'll lose tech that way."

The mood changed when Rick pulled out a laptop with no hint of surprise on his face. "And that, mes amis, is why you always have a backup plan. I.e. set up a scheduled upload from different places before you tell anyone what you have." That received a mixed response. Valerie looked impressed with their foresight, Dash looked skeptical of their claim and Paulina looked hopeful that she'd finally be getting her beloved in her room at last. Tucker was a mix of impressed with the twins and annoyed with himself for not checking that far, Sam was tense and hoping to be able to find a way to help block any summons, and Danny was simply done. Horrified at the fact that everyone in Casper was going to call him? Yes. But he simply ran out of the energy to care anymore and let his head hit the table, whatever the public educational system called meat slipping into his mouth at an apathetic pace.

The website came up as George inspected the camera and frowned when he couldn't find any physical tampering, and everyone leaned into Rick's much appreciated personal space as he hit play. Sam decided to listen carefully to the only sound now filling the dead silence to hear what exact words brought him to them. "You got the chant ready?"

"Go with the blood." A pause where Paulina winced at the drawing of blood. "Magna heroicarum gelidus regem appellem mihi nomen tuum: Phantom!" Even though it was only a recording, Danny still felt an odd sort of pull. Not the physical kind, but a pull on his very soul towards the source of the words, but it wasn't as strong as it was the first time and he could shrug it off easier. Everyone else in the cafeteria proceeded to lose their minds when he appeared on screen, and Danny resigned himself to the fact that he was doomed.

Sam jotted down the incantation, and Tucker got to work on getting into the website ASAP so that he could delete the footage after lunch and find the backups before anyone else could get the footage and try it themselves, though some people had good enough memories. "And here's the part with the circle that we used, cause you gotta get it and the words right or it won't work at all." George was smiling bright, and Rick was grinning like a cat as he locked eyes with Tucker, realization flashing across the eyes of sophomore and freshman. "And our website is beyond secure so if you want to download the footage you have to email us for permission." Yup, he was doomed.

* * *

 

When the Pate Twins got home, they went up to their room, and Rick started doing some push-ups while George finished up what he had done with his homework on the way home. At some point, George must have finished, but Rick hadn't been paying attention for a while. It was a surprise when his brother spoke up again, reminding him that the guy was still in the room. "What was that look you were giving that guy at lunch?" Rick raised a brow at his brother, pausing in his exercise. "Don't even try Ricky, I saw you."

"That guy was on a PDA," George snorted at the thought of someone using one of those in these times, "and he was glaring our way. I think he's the one who erased the video, though I'm not sure how." Rick went back to his exercise as his brother barked out a laugh.

"Wow, if you're going to accuse someone of getting through, at least accuse someone who's using current technology." Turning in his chair to their laptop George opened it up and checked their site. It was a good thing that he had written an extra few lines of code into each page to tell him when something suspicious was happening. "Someone's trying to get onto the site… oh shut up, it doesn't mean that it's your precious sophomore crush."

Rick snorted and shook his head, rolling onto his back to start sit ups. "I'm not crushing on him Georgy, I don't know a thing about the guy. You're just mad that I'm right." The bespectacled teen laughed as he was flipped off. "How scandalous!"

"Do I need to throw some RAM at you? I know we have extra in the drawers." Met with more laughter, George blew his bangs out of his face and began throwing up several additional layers of protection around the video file.

* * *

 

"Those twins are good," Tucker grumbled under his breath as he glared at his PDA. "They caught me, and now there're more layers of encryption I have to go through before I can get to the video."

"You can keep them out Tuck, you're the best computer geek I've ever met." Sam patted his shoulder before turning back to Danny. The halfa in question had taken some chalk that the goth offered and closed his eyes. Shutting off his conscious thought and letting his hand move on its own lead to an interesting pattern being drawn out on Sam's floor. There was, of course, his DP logo in the center of it all, but surrounding it at five points that formed an upside down star, were a screwdriver, a thorned rose, a book, a sword and shield, and a revolver. When the circle was finished, the screwdriver began emitting a dull yellow glow, and the rose turned black. "Spooky. We know who three of those symbols are, but what about the gun and the medieval combo?"

Danny scratched his head looking down at the circle in bemusement. "No idea, though I feel that the star is appropriate." He jumped into the middle of it and floated above the DP. "Not only is no one gonna guess that, but it's also space related. I wonder I could expand it into a constellation?" There was a snort from Tucker before the weird pull happened again. This time, he knew what it was and the half second warning was enough for him to concentrate on pushing it away. "Well shit, now that they have my phone number somebody's trying to give me a supernatural phone call."

"Not a fan of having phans?" Tucker chuckled from where he was in a purple beanbag, sputtering when a pillow collided with his face. "Hey, it was a valid question!"

"True, but you were asking to be an asshole," Sam shrugged, picking up another pillow. "And this one is just because." She threw, but missed the technogeek, clicking her teeth in mock disappointment. "How are you holding up Danny?" She couldn't imagine how strange it felt to have people trying to teleport you to them.

"Well, I can now feel two calls coming in at the same time." He now sat in the air, legs crossed and face scrunched up in concentration. "I'm good for now, though, this circle seems to be holding me here pretty well." He was solidly confident in his ability to tell his phans no. That was, of course, before five other calls began pulling on his soul. The lines of chalk lit up with icy blue light as his form flickered for a moment. "No longer do I envy celebrities."

"And no longer can I get into their site from Sharon," Tuck sighed, fingers flying over the screen and buttons of his favored device. "I'll need to get on a computer to break through this new encryption. Looks home made. Where are you on that translation for the incantation?" He put air quotes around the word 'incantation' with a snort. "And how does it feel, having people try to summon you?"

"It's like a bunch of strings are pulling on me from nine different directions, and two of them are pretty strong pulls." With all the concentration he was putting into not being pulled away, Danny didn't really have the focus to stay in human form, or even notice that he had transformed. His eyes were screwed shut and he hovered a few inches higher than before over the chalk. The extra echo in his voice hadn't really gone away yet. "This is hard guys."

The purple eyed girl sighed and placed a hand on his shoulder to try and offer support. "I know it is Danny, but you have to will yourself to stay where you are. They'll give up eventually." He nodded and grit his teeth as his form flickered for a moment before returning to a solid state and Sam went back to her latin book, going over the words the twins had used. "If my translation is right, this says 'Oh great hero and icy king, I call you to me by your name: Phantom.' Pretty poetic if you ask me."

"I'll make sure to compliment them on their writing skills the next time I see them." Looking closely, Sam could see the halfa's eyes rolling behind their lids. "Why would it work if it calls me king?" One of the tugs finally stopped, and he was able to focus better, though the words were still echoing in his head, an odd rush of power from somewhere causing his aura to flair with icy blue light, the space between the chalk lines slowly being covered in frost. "I'm not a king."

"You sure Danny?" Tucker looked up from his PDA finally, done with adding to his own security so that the twins wouldn't be able to trace him. "Frostbite and the Far Frozen treat you like King Arthur."

"Well…" The halfa trailed off uncertainly before shrugging his shoulders, feeling another summons drop. "They only treat me like that because I beat Pariah and haven't done anything bad to him and his people."

"But you beat Pariah, Danny. The king of ghosts." Sam was giving him a look, he could feel it, and another pull lessened unto nothing. "Under the right circumstances, beating the king could make you the king."

"Seein as to how he can't get the ring without releasing Pariah and isn't of age to be the ruler of anything, he'd be the Prince at most." The technogeek pulled out his phone and looked up trials by combat. "Especially if it requires he have some consort or something before he can ascend to the crown. Though, that'd explain why Pariah went mad, if he had a wife or husband and they died in a battle or got poisoned or what have you."

Sam stared at Tucker for a moment, surprised by the sudden insight, before refocusing on the main topic at hand. "Did Pariah say anything before or during your fight that might have been off?" Danny tensed, and Sam got the feeling it wasn't because of a summoning. "Danny?"

"When I said to skip the witty banter and get to the part where I kicked his butt, he said that he 'accepted my terms.' Would that have anything to do with it?" He knew the answer by now but he'd be damned if he wasn't going to soak up his last seconds of denial before Sam told him-

"Sorry Danny, but it sounds like you won a trial by combat and became the rightful ruler of the ghost zone." What perfect timing for his blissful bubble to be burst as a pull that was stronger than the others yanked him away from the circle and the room in a flash of light.

* * *

 

Dash Baxter wasn't as essentially stupid as everyone thought he was. Sure, he was encouraged by his father to push people around to get what he wanted, and sure he may have gotten Kwan to do it instead of listening as much to him as he could have, but Dash did listen eventually. It just took until the end of the summer of freshman year to do it. He knew that he wasn't going to have much of any future if he didn't start actually learning, and Kwan was a pretty good tutor. So, even though he was still getting help from the occasional nerd, Dash wasn't as dumb as everyone thought. This was why he knew that he had to get everything just right to summon Danny Phantom into his room, but he also had to have something more. Everyone in town was going to be trying to summon him now, so he had to have something that stood out from the others.

Kwan was the one to come up with the idea, and damn did it make sense. "I looked up this kind of summoning thing, and usually if you want the entity's attention, you gotta have something to offer." Dash looked up from his drawing with a deep hum as his best friend spoke. "The more value it has to you personally, the more significant it is and the better your chances to get a response." The blond snapped his fingers and went to his closet, pulling out three of his childhood teddy bears. He placed them in the center of the summoning circle and pulled out his multi-tool, switching to the knife. "Considering it's Phantom, I doubt it'll take more than a couple drops of blood man."

"Yeah, I know. If I put too much, he'll probably get grossed out and leave right away, right?" Dash quickly made a cut along the tip of his finger and let a few drops hit the chalk. He then put a bandaid on the cut and looked to Kwan. "Ready?"

"Yeah." The Asian jock cleared his throat and looked over the words that the twins had helpfully typed down under the video for everyone to use. Taking a deep breath, he held out a hand to the circle. "Magna heroicarum gelidus regem appellem mihi nomen tuum: Phantom!" A moment of silence, and Kwan's phone died, the lights in the room shutting off and the candle flames flickering to blue and green. The jocks rubbed their arms through their jackets to push away the cold seeping from the circle. A flash and Danny Phantom floated above the circle. His body was glowing bright blue, his bangs had a bit of frost falling from them, and when his eyes focused in on his summoners, they flared from acid green to a blue as cold as the arctic.

"Dash and Kwan, huh?" Excitement over Phantom knowing their names was pushed aside quickly by the sharp tone of the hero's echoing voice.

"Yeah, Dash Baxter!" Dash simply looked excited, to Kwan's confusion. "You remember me from that time Fenton's dad's stupid ray gun thing shrunk us down to bite size and we fought that ghost together?" A quick glance to the left had the blond feeling a bit confused. Kwan was looking at them like he was crazy.

"Oh I remember who you are Dash," that was not a pleasant tone of voice, and Kwan was wondering what his friend did to piss off the town hero, and how he could possibly be deaf enough not to see that right away. "What did you want exactly?"

"Dash, the contract." Kwan elbowed his friend in the ribs, a brow raised at the star struck quarterback. "We don't wanna keep him waiting, do we?"

"Oh yeah! I'd like to make a deal!" That had Danny perking up in spite of himself. Something about those words had his ghost half grinning. "Three of my teddy bears from when I was a kid in exchange for a couple of minutes to hang out with you." Dash held his hand, and Danny found himself shaking it before he could think properly about what he was doing.

"D̵eál!" The Bears in the circle shattered into a spray of snow and ice crystals, Danny's power sending it to who-knew-where as blue and green tendrils of energy flew from his hand up Dash's arm and he could feel a rush of power flooding his system that had his aura brightening, even more, casting odd shadows against the eerie green atmosphere that his presence had brought. He stepped out of the circle with ease and a grin. The lights and electricity coming back on. "So, what do you guys do in your free time?"

"Have you ever played football?" Kwan didn't like the grin that crossed the hero's face at that question, or how Dash paid no mind to the snow on his jacket sleeve.

"No, but I'm sure you can teach me how to play." Hero complex be damned, Danny was going to enjoy this.

* * *

 

"So, I looked up the guy in last year's yearbook," George turned to Rick as his brother walked into their room, walking away from his corkboard filled with notes and pictures connected to reported cryptid sightings in Amity Park to their laptop. "His name is Tucker Foley, he's a sophomore, and he sucks at anything physical accord his PE records."

"You broke into his records and looked at his grades?" Rick raised a brow and tossed his jacket onto his bed. "Are you suspecting him of being a werewolf?" George paused in his scrolling and Rick sighed, grabbing his brother's shoulders and shaking them. "No, bad Georgy, no more werewolf stories. Last semester we had to explain to the Longs why you were stalking their son and we almost got banned from football games, remember?"

"Oi, you brought that on us yourself!" George whirled and pointed an accusing finger between rick's glasses. "I only thought he was a werewolf because you mentioned that he's got the speed and strength to be a young one in hiding." A smirk curled across his face as his finger was swatted to the side. "It was just cause you wanted an excuse to observe his muscles from afar, wasn't it?"

"No, you geek, I said it cause I thought it was a funny joke." Rick rolled his eyes and flopped back onto his bed. "I went with you on your stalking escapades because I knew you'd get caught the second you tried to do it without me, and look what happened?"

"Whatever you say loverboy," George shrugged and turned back to the laptop. "You have good taste at least… anyways, this guy Foley, he's got the best encryption I've ever seen. I tried to get into his computer by tracing his DOOM account and spent the following hour debugging this thing." Rick heard the clacking of keystrokes and looked up to see that the screen had a new image on it. Blue eyes, pitch black hair, and the barest hint of makeup. "His buddy Danny Fenton's software was easier to get into, though, just needed a few minutes. Actually, it looks like I'm in now."

A quick look through the older boy's files showed an interesting folder labeled GZ. "Wanna take a look?"

"You're gonna do it whether I say to or not, so I guess." Rick sat up and leaned over his brother's shoulder as he clicked on the folder, looking through the subfolders. "Enemies, Allies, Neutral, Lairs… try Allies, I'm curious now." The files within were labeled with names, the most eye-catching one at the top. "Dude, Danny Phantom is listed as one of his allies."


	3. Apparitional Accords

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> revenge is sweet and well hidden secrets are being searched for! edited 12/3/2016

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A certain blond has much more potential than the show gave him, so I'm giving him said potential!

As Sam finished tracing the chalk lines of the circle with the lipstick laser, on an adjusted intensity so that it engraved the symbols into her floor cleanly, it flared up with light, and the laser was cut off. A flash of light and Danny was floating above the circle with a grin befitting the Cheshire cat. Another flash and his jumpsuit were replaced by his green galaxy hoodie and jeans, standing on the circle instead of floating above it. "Boo." He snickered at the echo in his voice.

"You weren't all giggly last time," Sam quirked a brow at her friend. "You get doused in laughing gas, echo echo?"

Danny snorted at the joke and focused on the strings that had been pulling on him earlier. Noting their absence, he flopped onto the goth's bed. "Oh, you'll never guess who's cooking I just had." It was still a shock to him that the quarterback was a good chef, even with the rough toss that he had caught when Danny 'accidentally' put too much force in his throw. He held back, of course, didn't want to hurt the guy really, but revenge was sweet. "Dash and Kwan made a deal with me to stay for a little bit, and I kinda said yes before I finished hearing the whole deal. It's weird; I feel like I could take on the Fright Knight right now!" He flopped onto the bed and looked over his friend's shoulder, frowning when he didn't understand the words. "What're you reading up on now?"

"Whoa whoa man, back up." Tucker swiveled entirely in Sam's chair and raised a brow, pointing at the raven haired teen. "You made a deal with Dash? Like, Deal with the Devil variety? Is that why you're all hyped up?"

Danny shrugged and rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, yeah. It was like my ghost half took over for a sec and I couldn't say no to the offer. Which is weird, cause what am I gonna do with a trio of teddy bears?" His face switched from a thoughtful drifting of his eyes to a miffed frown. "I'm not devilish enough to call it that, though. More of… an Apparitional Accords."

Tucker snorted at what the offering had been, and Sam raised a brow, looking around and noting the lack of bears. "While that's nice and fancy, I don't expect high school students to use it. And what happened to the bears?"

"Hm? Oh, they were frozen under me when I got there and they just… poofed into snow dust when I accepted." He made a poofing motion and snow collected in his hand before forming into the shape of a bear. The snow dust fell away, and a confused Danny was holding a plush teddy bear. "Ooookay then."

"Before we go into your whole teleporting stuff into your hands at random power," Tucker cut in before the halfa could get any further, even as he typed that into his file on Danny in his PDA. "And how you managed to teleport back, I feel we should talk about this king thing."

"I got summoned to Dash's house and spent fifteen minutes without getting much payback with him Tuck," Danny put on the most convincing pity face he could manage and let out a tired sigh. "I don't feel like thinking hard anymore." His friends exchanged a look, and Danny almost thought he would be getting away from it all.

"We can't avoid it forever Danny," Sam gave him a sympathetic smile. "besides, you might wanna make sure that no one summons you in your sleep, so you should wait until night time."

"Fine," he groaned and dropped the look. "But what exactly are we going to talk about when it comes to this? I don't know anything about being a king. I'm pretty sure the Ghost Zone is autonomous and self-sustaining nowadays."

"Well, we can start with the Fright Knight." The others raised a brow at the techno geek, and he returned the gesture. "You brought him up first, and it reminded me that even though he's been free since Pariah was beaten, he never made any moves to take over the world and send us all into an eternal Halloween night or avenge his fallen king. He hasn't been a problem at all."

"Which is weird for someone who looked to be on Vlad's side at the end of it all, although I was kinda blacking out at the time." Still, Danny could have sworn Vlad had said something about turning a knight, which had to mean the Fight Knight, but where had he been all this time? A blue wisp of air flew out of Danny's mouth, and a shiver ran down his spine that told him he had more to worry about at the moment. "Well, I said I could take Fright, let's see who wants to try me on now." Light filled the room as Danny changed to Phantom and flew out the window, Tucker grabbing an ecto pistol out of his bag as he headed out the room, Sam doing the same.

When Danny found the ghost that set off his ghost sense he was surprised, to say the least. "Speak of the devil; we were just talking about you, Fright. Come to cash in your overdue Beat Down Card™?" The halfa's aura shifted to a bright blue as Nightmare reared and neighed at him, a sword of ice forming in his hand. "Those are non-refundable, by the way."

The black-clad knight narrowed his eyes at the teen, acid in his gaze making the spectral teen tense up in preparation to dodge a blast. "Daniel Phantom, come with me post haste, there are things that I must discuss with you." Danny's eyes widened a bit before narrowing in suspicion, his arms crossing loosely enough that he could quickly block an attack if it came. Noting the hero's hesitation, the Knight pulled out his sword and pointed to a spot in the woods. "I shall meet you in the woods young Phantom; you have my word that I shall not harm you." Fright then took off toward the trees and Tucker and Sam burst through her front doors.

"Who is it, Danny? Someone negotiable?" Sam was really appreciative of the ghosts that actually stopped and listened when Danny reminded them of the laws of the living. Ghost fights were fun and all, but it was more fun to wrap things up quickly and get back to real fun like bowling, star gazing and laughing at Blister horror movies because they've seen far more horrifying in real life.

"Why are you glowing blue instead of white?" Was it a bit off on the seriousness scale of the situation? Possibly. Was the question entirely valid? Yes. "It's not usually noticeable but your glow is brighter than normal, and it's blue."

"In order," Danny looked down at his fingers as he counted off the points, noting his icy aura with a hum of interest and a vertical flip so that he was upside down. "Fight Knight asked me to meet him in the woods and promised that he wouldn't hurt me," that earned a snort of 'fat chance' from Sam and a raised brow from Tucker, "And I didn't know I was glowing blue. Today is a weird day."

"Think we can trust him to keep his word?" The goth was skeptical and reasonably so. "He's got no real reason to be peaceful all of a sudden."

"True, but he's a knight," Tucker raised his arm as he pointed out the - in his opinion - critical flaw in his friend's reasoning. "Like a legit Knight served for a king and everything Sam. He's honor bound to keep his word. Regardless of the Halloween part, being a knight and having his honor would be the biggest parts of his obsession."

"Tucker has a point, Sam." Danny made duplicates, which he was getting better at, to pick up his friends and shrugged. "Plus I get this weird feeling that I can trust him. I dunno why I just do." Sam, though still not really trusting the older ghost, shrugged and charged up her ecto pistol. "Plus you two will be invisible and ready to help if he does go back on his word." A grin stretched on the goth's face, and she hooked an arm over the duplicate's shoulder to get a better hold when he lifted off the ground, and an odd chill flowed through her as they vanished from sight.

Ready to listen, and for an ambush, the trio flew toward where the Fright Knight was waiting while Nightmare grazed on the grass, almost surprising the three that she could do anything in a non-threatening manner. When the knight saw Danny land, he surprised the hero entirely by crouching down on one knee and holding up his sword in his hands with his head bowed. "Lord Phantom, it has come to my attention that you are now aware of your position of power in the Ghost Zone. As such I, your Fright Knight, pledge myself, my service, and my undying loyalty to you, my Prince."

Green eyes shifted to blue and cold rushed through Danny's body as though a blizzard had been set into motion within him. He grasped the handle of Soul Shredder and lifted it to rest the flat of the blade against his shoulder. " _A knight does not make himself a knight, the King does._ " Acid eyes widened, and Fright's head snapped up to stare at the halfa. His voice was resonating with energy and pink light blazed from the center of his forehead. " _And why should I accept you as my Knight, Fright?"_ The Spirit of Fear schooled his expression quickly, hiding the outrage he felt at having to prove himself to a child.

"I have experience that you do not, my liege. Knowledge of the Spirit Kingdom that a warrior as young as yourself would not have been told of." The black clad warrior spoke slowly, as though Danny were incompetent (that's a ridiculous thought, he's picking his words). "I could teach you the use of powers you may not be aware that you have."

" _I have Queen Pandora, Princess Dorothea, and King Frostbite to tell me of these things and teach me of these powers._ "

"But they have responsibilities to tend to. The queen of hope must protect her box, the dragon princess must look over the progression of her people," the plume of flaming cape that burned behind the Knight (not yet a knight, he's a former knight) brightened and bathed the area in heat for a moment. "And the yeti chieftain must keep his artifacts safe. None others are devoted solely to serving you, my Prince."

Danny thought it over for a moment, head tilting to the side and eyes unblinking as they bored into the Fright Knight. He then raised the Soul Shredder and tapped the fear mongering spirit's shoulders and head with the tip of the blade. " _I accept your service as my Knight and welcome you to my court. Should you betray me, your end shall be swift dear Fright._ "

"Were I to betray my liege," Fright bowed his head, grinning beneath his helm. "I would surely deserve such a demise."

The duplicates disappeared, and Sam and Tucker walked into the clearing with their guns down. "What was all that about man? You were acting like you've been royalty all your life." Danny raised a brow at the other boy before Sam spoke up.

"Yeah, I've heard of power changing a person, but that was a bit quick, even for you." She was eying the flaming haired ghost warily, not entirely sure if he would attack them now that he knew they were there, but Danny was trusting him, so she would go along with it for now. "Do you have any explanations Fright?"

"I have a theory, but nothing more, as there are only two half-bloods in current existence and I was not alive to see the first age of your kind, my Prince." That gave Danny pause, and he held up a hand.

"Wait, wait, hang on, I thought that Vlad and I were the first halfas to exist? Are you saying that there were others before us?" If that was true, then they could look through the Zone at some point and find out if they became full ghosts or simply stopped existing once their human lives ended. And if the former… well, Fright was right in that the other royals of the Zone had better things to do than help him learn about his powers.

"Yes, my Prince," Fright raised a brow at the teen as he was given permission to rise to his full height. "Legends say that they were called demigods by humanity in their height." Anticipating the following question, Fright shook his head whilst sheathing the Soul Shredder. "I know not whether any still live in the Spirit Kingdom."

Danny's shoulders slumped, and Tucker patted his shoulder before he straightened with a sigh. "Alright, I'll look into that later. What's your theory about what I just did?"

"And why there's a tattoo on Danny's forehead now?" Tucker snapped a picture to show the halfa and frowned in confusion. There was now a cloud inked into his skin, the coloration resembling that of a birthmark more than a tattoo.

"That would be one of the marks of the king." There was a hint of shock in Fright's voice and the smell of burning grass wafted into the air as his fists clenched. "It symbolizes that you have passed one of the trials of becoming the next king in the eyes of the ancients. The reason for your change in personality lay in your ghost half, I think. Your core holds all that you are and the part of you that knows instinctively that you are the heir to the throne responded to the direct addressal of your position."

"You speak as though my two halves are two different people." Danny's voice stayed steady, but inside he was starting to feel nervous as an old fear that he tried to push away began to stir inside his mind.

"Essentially, they are, and they are not." Fright paused to find the right words as his mare came up behind him, waiting to ride again. "A spirit is different in mind to a human as well as in body. The differences that your ghost half brings rest within your subconscious mind, a part of you that reacts instinctively in a different way than you would have before you were changed. When a spirit becomes king, they change to meet the duties of a king."

"But you didn't call me king," it was something they all noticed but didn't want to interrupt to find out. "You called me Prince instead of king. Why?"

"Because, my Prince, you have not yet been adequately coronated, and the Ring of Rage still adorns Pariah's hand." Always a catch to these things, not that Danny was in any rush for power. "Once you are properly coronated and accept your place as the Ruler of Spirits the ring should come to you." Danny nodded and let out a sigh. He needed to sleep this information away, but he still needed one more bit of info.

"Alright Fright, I've got a task for you. If you can, find out whether or not any of the halfas of the past still live on as ghosts and if so, see if you can get them to come back. I'd really like their help." The knight bowed his head and mounted his steed. "I'll call you if I have further need of you. Safe travels, Fright."

"Thank you, my Prince." Fright nodded, and a vortex of violet light appeared, his sinister looking alicorn rearing once more before flying in.

Danny took in a deep breath and let it out slowly, all the formality melting away as he relaxed. "OK, I'm a prince, Dash's teddy bears gave me power and the Fright Knight listens to me now. Did I miss anything?"

Both friends laughed, and Sam added, "Your ghost half also has a weird, instinct level affect on your psyche, Dash somehow summoned you through the circle we put up to hold you and when you speak royally you go from white to blue and act like a real prince, demigods were actually half-ghosts."

"Which means that ghosts and humans are biologically compatible as far as reproduction goes, and you now have a cloud on your forehead." Tucker ruffled Danny's hair and looked down at Sharon, dodging a half-hearted swing. "Other than that you got everything." Tucker finished up on Danny's file, and the little side note about demons and to look more into them later for future reference, and put his PDA away. "You can freak out now."

Danny shook his head with a grin. "Nah, I'll do that gradually. Besides, I think we can handle this. We should probably tell Jazz, though, so that she knows in case we need one of you to summon me and you guys are busy fighting off ghosts. For now, I need to add concealer because I have a feeling that this will transfer over to my human half" Sighing again he wrapped an arm around each friend and took off toward Sam's house.


	4. Thursday Deals Block Calls That get Redirected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is stuff

When Danny got home, he sent an invisible duplicate up to his room to do his homework while he headed to Jazz’s room. He knocked and was greeted by the sight of his older sister pouring herself over three different books, one of which she was scrawling notes into. “Hey, Spazz.”  
“Baby Manny,” Jazz responded automatically, a grin rising to her face. “What’s going on little brother?” Her face fell into concern. “That video of those twins summoning you like a demon isn’t real, is it? Just doctored footage.”  
Danny sighed and kicked her door closed, leaning on it. “No, unfortunately. That’s what I came to tell you about: the whole school now has my cosmic phone number, and about nine people tried to call at once today. And then Dash managed to get me to come to him.”  
Jazz’s eyes widened quickly and pushed away from her books. “What happened when you got there and why did you go?” There was only the slightest tinge of judgment that Danny could hear in her tone, though he couldn’t blame her. He felt the same way about Jazz tutoring Dash.  
“Apparently if you want to summon a ghost, you draw the circle, add some blood and put in a bonus sacrifice to make sure it wor- no I mean put something special in the circle, not human sacrifice Jazz!” The horrified expression on his sister’s face relaxed into a relieved one and he chuckled. “Yeesh, he may be an ass but he’s not a twisted cultist. Thankfully, none of my phans have gotten that crazy.” The blue eyed teen made his way over to Jazz’s bed and sat down with a flop. “He offered me teddy bears for like, fifteen minutes of hanging out and I accepted before I knew what I was doing. I shook his hand felt a surge of energy.” Looking at the ceiling as he spoke was a great way for Danny to ignore the sound of pencil scratching against paper as Jazz took notes on what he said. Likely, she wanted to analyze it all for any clues it could give her on his psyche. “Then I played football with him. Did you know that he can cook?”  
“Yes, actually, he baked me cookies when I tried to tutor him.” Jazz looked up and scoffed at the way Danny’s eyes narrowed. “Please, little brother, I could have him crying for his mother in three seconds if he tried to make a move I didn't like. You know that.” A grin crawled onto Danny’s face, but the ghost boy managed a disappointed tone.  
“I also know that you won’t record it for me, which is frustrating because you know how much I would love to see that.” The two had laughed for a moment before Jazz sobered the moment up with a sigh.  
“What are you going to do, little brother? You can’t concentrate every minute of the day on resisting summons.” She hummed in thought, trying to figure it out for herself so that Danny wouldn’t have to. It was always something that Danny viewed in a bittersweet light.  
“I could make a deal with you to keep me from answering summonings from anyone all night?” He shrugged, not sure if that would work. The halfa took a breath and closed his eyes, prodding at the coldness of his core. Information buzzed in his head, and when he opened his eyes, they were glowing an iridescent blue. “In exchange… you promise to get me a new astrology book for my birthday?”  
“Deal, I guess.” Jazz shrugged and reached out to shake Danny’s extended one, shivering when blue light enveloped both for a moment. “Are your hands just perpetually cold?”  
“Yes,” Danny grinned and pressed his palm to the back of his sister’s neck, laughing when she swatted his arm away with a jolt. “I am half dead and have an ice core; my hands shall forever be as cold as snow.”  
“You take your cold hands out of here before I shine a sunlamp at you!”

* * *

  
It was no surprise when the trio got to school and found everyone was disappointed by the fact that they couldn’t summon Danny, but more than Dash and Kwan had an explanation for why. “Don’t tell me everyone tried it on the same day?” George actually sounded surprised, Rick shaking his head at everyone that was complaining to them. “You guys understand that he has an afterlife right? Things other than Amity to do? If a billion people called me out of nowhere with nothing to offer I wouldn’t be answering either.”  
“Plus if you wanted something from him you’d have to give him something in return,” Rick rolled his eyes at the surprise on everyone’s faces. “That’s how getting things from a ghost works - especially someone as busy as him.”  
“Well duh,” all heads turned to Dash as he walked by, headed to his locker to grab something and to try not to soothe a hand up and down his slightly bruised arm. Phantom had a mean throw. “Me and Kwan had the sense to have something important to give im.” The bespectacled twin raised a brow at that, and Valerie snorted at the thought. So they needed to give the ghost something in order to get him?  
“Important,” George clarified with a grin as the bell rang, “to the one making the offer. Unless of course, he asks for something specific when he gets there. Another thing-”  
“-is the power of Intent. The more you want him to appear the better your chances that he will, but considering that he’s a very busy spirit-”  
“-those chances are slim unless he’s relaxing and you have something interesting to give him.” The twins grinned as they waved everyone off and took their seats in English, resigning themselves to Mr. Lancer’s newest lecture.  
“Attention class, attention.” Some of the class did, in fact, turn to look at the pot-bellied man, but most were far more interested in talking about their failed summoning of Phantom so he had to raise his voice, as usual. “Lord of the Rings, people! Settle down!” There was another second of murmuring before the class went quiet and half started pretending to pay attention while the other actually did. Lancer let out a sigh as he took in who was who before starting. “Today we shall be starting a new reading, and no, I will not be giving out any study guides for the test until a week before.” There was a collective groan from the class except for Rick, who relished in things like this. He was, of course, the one Lancer called on to hand out the books, cover down, and was pleasantly surprised by what they were supposed to read. “Now, with all the craze around summoning ghosts recently,” their teacher was a user of the internet, he had to be if he knew this quickly, “I decided that we should read up on Algol : Calling Upon the Stars a great read that you all are sure to appreciate.”  
The mention of summoning had grabbed everyone’s attention and had George wondering just what Lancer was thinking, giving everyone ideas that a particular hero was sure to not like. He and Rick had read the book before, though he had only skimmed it, and he knew that there were some less than realistic aspects that one definitely shouldn’t expect when summoning a real ghost. He accepted the book regardless - it wasn’t his fault if people didn’t have the common sense not to try and call out something random.

* * *

At lunch, Rick checked their site, and was a bit surprised when he saw that there were hits from outside of Amity, and not just from Elmerton. He looked up to point it out to his twin when he noticed that the other’s bright blue gaze was locked on something, and followed it to the table where Foley and Fenton were sitting. “Are you going to stalk one of them? Cause I have a match this week and I can’t help you tail people till after the match, sorry.”  
“I am not a stalker,” George growled, giving his brother’s arm a shove. “I just get suspicious and try to find stuff out.” A skeptical hum from the bespectacled twin and George let out a huff. “What did you find? That’s why you looked up, isn’t it?”  
Rick gave his brother one more nudge in the ribs before pointing at their laptop. “We got hits from outside of Illinois. I thought people outside of the damn city didn’t believe in the ghosts, let alone the state.”  
“Potential tourist wanting to see if there’s a new way to activate the holograms they think make up the ghost attacks?” George shrugged, taking a sip of his milk. “Or it's a cult. Do cults even still exist?”  
“Probably not, I mean what kind of cult would spring up to worship a superhero? Don't they usually worship Dark Gods who want to cleanse the Earth of all of humanity? It’s not like Danny Phantom would want any human sacrifices or anything like that.” George watched with narrowed eyes as Fenton tensed and began to choke on his food. “At least there's no one trying to summon Phantom from outside the state yet. that would be a whole bowl of annoyance for him.”

Danny coughed a bit after managing to swallow down his sandwich and scrubbed a hand down his face, which he kept in his hand, where he would forever keep it. “I know that the school food is disgusting, but you usually manage not to choke on it like that.” Danny snorted at the sound of Sam’s voice, reminding him that he was still eating with his friends.  
“Apparently someone outside of Amity, no,” he let his hand drop to gesture dramatically, “outside of the state, looked at the site! Hell, I can feel the pull of a summons right now.”  
“You don't look to be concentrating too hard on not leaving us,” Tuck noted, taking a sip of his chocolate milkshake. “Something happen?”  
“Yeah I had made a deal with Jazz this morning so that I wouldn't be able to be taken outside of Amity by any summoning so long as she promises to get me a new astrology book for my birthday.” Danny grinned and fist bumped both of his friends, proud of the clever thinking between him and his sister "I can still feel the summons but the deal is canceling out its pull.” He shrugged and picked up his food, "it's a poorly done summons anyways.”  
“You can tell if it's a bad summon or not?” Tucker’s eyes went wide with fascination. “How?”  
“I don't know,” he shrugged. “I just somehow know what they're doing, and they're doing it wrong. even if it weren't for the deal, I could still say no to it pretty easily because there's almost no effort put into it.” His face twisted into disgust. “pretty sure they're using Pig's blood or something from steak to get me there. It's actually kind of embarrassing.  
“I'm more concerned about what those twins are talking about.  The one with the highlight in his hair, George, He suggested it might be a cult.” Here Danny turned to Sam with a worried gaze. “those things don't still exist do they?”  
“And if they did, I would be the one to know about it right?” Sam snorted and crossed her arms, feeling a bit stereotyped. “I don’t know everything occult Danny; I just like the books on the stuff.”  
“Unfortunately some of them do, though they call themselves followers of their ‘True God’, regardless of which one you’re talking about.” Tucker shrugged off the look his friends gave him and continued going through his search results. “I’m more than just tech and meat you know. Video Game lore and stories have to have some kind of baseline and that’s usually in myth, which used to be the religion of those who came up with it.” As if on cue, Danny heard chanting, except it wasn’t the same words as what Rick had come up with for everyone. They were stronger, and the pull of intent was more powerful than any in Amity. “I thought something like this would happen actually, and came prepared.” The technogeek then pulled out what Danny and Sam were sure he didn’t own: a notebook with actual paper. Tearing out a page discreetly and muttering the chant the twins had made under his breath almost fluently, Tucker pricked his finger with his fork, which he wiped off with the napkin, and let a couple of drops hit the page. The circle that had been drawn onto it glowed under the table and Danny’s eyes flashed bright green before he switched them to blue, knowing full well that he wouldn’t be able to keep them human. “I offer you three Nasty Burgers of your choice, on me after school for you ignoring any and all summons after school until the first bell of school tomorrow morning. Deal?”  
Danny nodded and grasped the offered hand under the table, tendrils of energy flowing out of his hand and along his friend’s arm. “D̸e̕al.” There was that odd reverb in his voice again, though it was lesser now that he was in human form. They shook hands, and his eyes went back to normal, the voices calling to him easier to ignore now. “Thanks, Tuck, you’re a lifesaver.”  
“No problem man, anything for my brother.” The two fist-bumped and went on with their lunch, thinking of ways to deal with anyone dangerous that might get their hands on the circle. Of course, they didn’t realize that George had been staring at them the whole time, and Rick would actually never believe _this_ without proof.

* * *

After school, in a pink painted room filled with all the latest trending things and pink wax candles, a latina cheerleader lay down her most prized photo of her beloved in the center of the circle drawn. She pulled out the knife she had bought specifically for this occasion and gave herself a light cut. Enough that it would grab his attention, but shallow enough not to need immediate bandaging. The blood hit the circle and the latin rolled off of her tongue like a well-rehearsed song, since she practiced it several times the day before, and a few minutes ago. The D glowed an iridescent green and the P a vibrant pink, and she knew something had gone wrong. The candle flames flickered from reddish orange and yellow to green and pink, the lights in the room shutting down. Flowers began to grow up from the symbol on the floor, ice crystals danced in the shifting winds and electrical sparks surged from crystal to crystal. There was a snap not unlike a lightning strike, and a halo appeared in the midst of the elemental storm, splitting in two to reveal the wrong green eyed ghost teen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I edited this on 12/3/2016  
> so yeah, I changed something up. To introduce a fav a bit sooner than before. don't worry her old appearance will pop up again soon.


	5. Deals and Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning, this chapter has a minor character's death in it. the character is an OC. it also involves Danny fucking up Aaragon's shit.

The last thing she remembered, Elle was learning from a shaman down in Brazil by the name of Mama Zee and finally figuring out how to draw energy from the earth instead of the ghost zone.  After all, portals to the GZ were hard to come across at best, so if she was attacked, the halfa would need to be able to rely on her human side as much as her ghost half. 

Then there was a strange feeling, the sound of someone speaking in her brain - though it was more like someone was talking to someone else near her and she was getting the info - and then another stronger feeling.  Pulling, yanking, heaving, wrenching.  She opened her eyes and the ghost girl was in ghost form, in someone’s room, and disoriented.

“Oh merda, o que em nome da mãe Gaia está acontecendo?”  She muttered and after a few seconds was able to register who was standing in front of her.  A tall bronze skinned girl with long black curls and perfectly manicured fingernails.  She looked confused and horrified at the same time.  “Olá? você fala português?  ¿Español?”  A look of recognition and curiosity.  “oh Dios. ¿Puedes decirme dónde estoy?”

“Estás en Amity Park. ¿Por qué llevas el símbolo de mi amante?”  Paulina replied sharply, eyes narrowing to the DP on this child’s chest.  It brought up disturbing thoughts about how ghosts never age and her Ghost Boy could very well be hundreds of years old.  could this be his daughter?

“Oh, Amity?”  Elle looked around the room again and noted the newspaper clippings and posters of Danny and snorted.  “I take it you’re one of my brother’s phans?  Isn’t a demonic summoning ritual going a bit far for his attention?”  She crossed her arms and rolled her eyes.  “This is why I told him to start an online presence for Phans to contact him.  Hi,” she reached out, hand sparking pink and green as it cut through a translucent barrier in the air.  “My name is Elle Phantom, I’m the little sister of the ghost you summoned and I think there’s been a mix-up.”

Paulina gave the ghost girl a calculating look, something that would have surprised that desvergonzada, Manson.  Then she smiled sweetly at the girl - genuinely instead of the smile, she gave teachers and pig headed boys who wanted to date her.  This was the younger sister of her future husband, after all, it just wouldn’t do to be cruel to her future in law.  “Hello, Elle,” she reached out and shook the white haired girl’s hand.  “It’s nice to meet you.  My name is Paulina Sanchez, and your brother’s cosmic cellphone number was recently given to the internet and school.”  She gestured to the chalk drawn down on the floor.  “As pleasant as meeting you is, I happened to be trying to call your brother.  Any idea what happened?”  

The girl flipped onto her back in the air and sighed.  “Not really… though knowing him and the others, he’s figured out a way to block calls.  Wish I could be more helpful to you on that one.”

“Well,” Paulina shrugged, quickly thinking over her words.  “Maybe you can help me out another way.  If you can get me in contact with your brother… I’ll lend you any set of clothes that fit you and give you a touch up on that fabulous hair of yours.  Deal?”

Elle reached out almost immediately before catching herself and humming in thought.  She really needed to get back to Mama Zee, and there was no guarantee that she could get Danny to contact this girl.  On the other hand, a quick salon treatment wouldn’t hurt, and Mama Zee was an understanding lady.  This time she grasped the outstretched hand with purpose and shook it.  “D̨҉e҉̨͠a̢l.”  Elle’s voice echoed off of the walls and sparks of pink and green danced over their joined hands.  The heatwave like shimmer in the air outlining the circle vanished as Elle took a step out of it.  “So, first thing’s first - can I see those clothes?”

Paulina pulled up her online catalog with a grin and let the ghost girl go through to pick whatever she wanted.

* * *

 

"Ok so there is at least some multilayer encryption on these files," George huffed, looking over the coding.  "This is the same kind of encryption as what was on Foley's files.  I can't get into the Elle Phantom, Red Huntress or Vlad Plasmius files.  I bet there are others I can't touch, like that Dan Phantom file, but other than that it's pretty clear."  The geeky twin turned to his brother as they walked through the woods, looking up from his phone.  "That Danny Fenton kid is a ghost hunter who has allies in the ghost world."

"Not a surprise really, his parents are ghost hunters."   Rick paid more attention to the path than his brother's rambling but he listened enough to get what Georgy was saying.  "And if anyone pays attention they'll see that he's got plenty of definition on his arms."  Out the corner of his eye, Rick saw the sly grin on George's face and rolled his eyes.  "No, George, I do not have a crush on Danny Fenton.  Just cause I notice someone's body doesn't mean I have a crush on them."

"No, but your last boyfriend was the same definition of physical fitness and what you dream of becoming through your boxing."  George laughed as he rubbed the arm that his twin punched, putting his phone in his pocket.  "Still sore?"

"You will be beyond sore if you don't drop it,"  Rick growled before looking up at the tree that they had stopped in front of.  It was the tallest one in the forest, and the two had climbed it every time they went out with their dad.  The athletic twin turned with his back to the bark and crouched down, hands cupped in front of him.  George stepped on his hands and he lifted him up with little effort.  When George grabbed onto the lowest branch, Rick reached up to grab onto his hand and laughed when the nerdier boy managed to lift him.  "Wow, you've been skipping out on your exercise and protein.  I doubt you'll be any challenge to me today."

“I always win man, you know this!”  And like that Rick shot up the tree, pulling himself up to every branch in front of him, just like George was doing.  Except George was better at finding proper footholds and climbed faster than him.  As predicted, the highlighted twin reached the top first and threw up his arms in cheer.  “The world champion retains his title!  George, George, George!”  As his brother reached the same branch only a moment later, he cupped his hands and imitated a crowd going wild.

“Alright, alright, champion of the dorks,” Rick laughed and looked out over the forest, taking a deep breath and enjoying the freshness of the air this far in, away from the city.  "So, why are you looking so deeply into this junior ghost hunter?"

"Because, man!"  George flailed his arms out and leaned against the trunk of the tree.  "Who else has ghostly friends?  Especially amongst ghost hunters!  We could learn some really cool shit from this guy, man, but there's something weird."

"Other than the fact that he A hunts ghosts and B has ghostly friends and allies?"  Rick raised a brow as he reached for an apple and gently twisted it.  "I think that sets the bar pretty high for 'weird'."

"Yeah, but if you were friends with the most famous ghost in the city," George looked over at the sun as he rolled over his question in his head.  "Wouldn't you wanna tell everybody?  Advocate ghost rights or something?  Show the world that the dead can be just as friendly as the living?  Get popular as fuck in school because you know, are friends with, and help a superhero?"

Rick thought about that for a moment, closing his eyes and letting the feeling of the fading sunlight's warmth guide him through his imagination.  Fighting side by side with Danny Phantom, getting to know the guy, gaining ghostly friends, getting idiots at school like Dash to fuck off because of who he was friends with.  But then the thoughts turned as sour as the bark digging into his back was rough, having laid down on the branch with his legs stretched out.  "He'd be popular because of who his friend is, not because of who he is.  And think about his parents; would you want everyone to know that you're a friend with the ghost that your parents hate the most?"

"Yeah, okay," George sighed.  "I guess you have a point there.  I bet he'd get grounded in an instant if his parents found out about that.  or worse, they'd follow him around and attack Phantom on sight."  George grabbed his own apple when he heard his brother bite into one, hoping that Phantom was having a well enough day.  They sorta fucked him over with what they did, giving everyone a way to fight for his attention.

* * *

 

Danny put down his guitar with a sigh and smiled at his friends as they applauded him.  “Thanks, guys, it wasn’t much, though, really.”

“Wasn’t much?”  Tucker looked personally insulted by the statement.  “Dude, you took one of Sam’s creepy poems about death and turned it into a beautiful song!  It’s plenty much.”

“As rude as that was,” Sam clipped the geek’s shoulder without looking.  “Tucker’s right Danny, you have an amazing talent.  I bet with a couple lessons you could even take on Ember in a rock off.”

“I thought you hated Ember’s music?”  Danny raised a brow in confusion because he was most definitely not blushing right now, not at all.

“I never actually listened to it you know?”  She shrugged and leaned back on her hands.  “It’s actually a good song when it isn’t hypnotizing people.”

Danny opened his mouth to respond and shivered as a blue wisp of cold air flowed out of his mouth.  The halos of his transformation flashed over him and his friends got out their ecto pistols.  “Great, I was wondering when something normal would happen.”  He grabbed them by the waist and flew through the window, eyes widening when he saw that it was Aragon of all ghosts.  “Ah the fallen prince, finally released on good behavior?”  Danny ducked down under a weak ectoblast that didn’t even dent the protected walls of his home and flew to the ground, letting off Tuck and Sam before his aura switched again.  “I guess not.  Why are you here?”

“After I escaped from the prison that my treacherous sister locked me in, I heard tell from the Fright Knight that he was waiting for his ‘Prince Phantom’s’ call.”  The fallen prince spat out at them and pulled out his amulet, which wrapped itself around his neck as it glowed.  “Apparently the young hybrid has defeated Pariah whilst I was imprisoned!  We cannot have a halfling ruling our kind, especially one as weak and misguided as you!”  As he taunted he grew into his black and purple dragon form, chest rumbling in anger.  “So I shall take you on myself and become our new king!”

At the direct challenge, Danny’s aura flared up like a Christmas tree and his eyes flashed bright blue.  “You have the balls to challenge me now?   _ Challenge accepted _ .”  The dragon took a deep breath and the three scattered, Sam and Tucker aiming for his wings as Danny flew over him and slammed a fist right into his face.  “ _ I am not the same ghost boy that I was a year ago, lizard breath, but you are as weak as you were then because you still refuse to advance with the times _ .”  A tail swatted him out of the air and the ghost boy found himself phasing through the pavement and into the ground until he could get himself to stop.  When he surfaced Tucker and Sam were behind a car, looking for weak points with each shot.

“You speak largely for a boy so small.”  Aragon slammed a taloned paw down on the car just as the two rolled away from it, roaring at them as Danny blasted him in the chest.  “While I shall admit that you have gained power, you are still no match for me.”

“ _ Big talk from a guy that’s been in jail this whole time and hasn’t been in a fight but one time. _ ”  Powerful wingbeats pushed the prince back but he flew around the current and brought his foot down on the dragon’s shoulder.  “ _ And that one time, you lost. _ ”  The tail caught him by surprise again, but this time it wrapped around his body like a snake and squeezed.  “ _ This is not the kind of hug I like, dude. _ ”

“Silence foolish whelp, whilst I finish this once and for all!”  Aragon took a deep breath as he squeezed tighter and tighter and shot out a stream of fire aimed directly at Danny’s head.

“ _ I think you _ ,” blue rays of frost shot out of the hero’s eyes and held the flames at bay, “ _ need to chill out _ .”  Ice crawled up the dragon’s tail and he was forced to cut his fire breath short with a scream as he released the prince and ended up with an ice coated punch that nearly broke his jaw, launching the scaly challenger into the air.  Danny then grabbed his tail and swung him into the ground, where Sam and Tucker were waiting to take their shots and hit him on both sides, breaking off a scale or two.  “ _ You, Aragon of the time locked lands, lose _ .”  Danny pulled out his thermos, prepared to send the ghost into the zone when an unexpected pull yanked him away from the scene.

The dragon stirred and the two junior ghost hunters aimed for his amulet, but before they could shoot it off he phased through the ground and rose up several yards away.  “If the boy cannot stay to finish me, then I shall take his kingdom piece by piece,” he declared with a melodramaticism that almost had Sam and Tucker rolling their eyes.  “Starting with this horrid modern village, which I shall burn to the ground and rebuild properly!”  Now was the time to get serious.  Thankfully, the Fentons showed up just then, and Jazz with her ghost peeler aimed straight for the dragon’s wing, just missing it by an inch as he flew out of the way.

“So close!  If I could have gotten his wing he’d be grounded and this would be easier.”

“Jazz…” Maddie started, but Jack cut her off with a blast from his bazooka at Aragon, who took the blast to the chest and roared in response.

“She’s a Fenton Maddie, ghost fighting is in the blood!  And I assume she trained Tuck and Sam on how to use those guns.”

“Can we discuss the weapons later and get to dealing with the megalomaniacal dragon please?”  Tucker was already running after Aragon since he was getting away and started shooting.  The other four soon joined in.

* * *

 

When Danny appeared in a dark room lit only by the green flames of the candles that had been involved in the ritual to summon him, he was mad.  His first thought was ' _ Fuck, Tucker forgot to get me that Nasty Burger!' _  And his second was to growl at the people around him in a way that a human throat wouldn't have been able to manage.  “I ͏wa͠s ̶j͟u͘s̴t́ ̶i͘n͜ a͘ fi̕g̶h͡t wi͞th ̕a cha͏lleng̨e̛r ͏t͏o͜ ͜m̸y̡ t͞i̸tle ̡t͢hat ́is ҉m̀ost̵ ͠like͡ly ̢ţea̶ŗi͜n̨g̕ dơwn̴ ͠m҉ý ͢t̢own,̢,” his anger reverberated in his voice in a way that scared the human part of him that was suddenly taking a back seat.  “Wh͏o s̸um͠m͝o҉ns͡ th̡è ̴P͞r͏i͜nçe ơf Spi͟rits̕?”

In front of him was a guy in a black robe with a silver sash around it, four others forming a circle around the circle in similar black robes, but only one had a sash.  The man bowed so deep his nose nearly hit the ground and he spoke as though to a king, which Phantom thought of as appropriate.  “Oh great lord Phantom, we wished only to pledge ourselves to you.  We have seen that you would answer the calls, and we have seen what you can do.  The fools of amity park would try to get rid of a lord of such power, but we,” the man rose to his full height and smiled, the only thing about him that could be seen in the lighting with that hood on.  “We have devoted ourselves to you, and wish only to grant you whatever it is that you wish.” A chorus of ‘Hail Lord Phantom’ rose up among the group.

And of course, like Rick predicted, a cult sprung up and summoned him.  “So you saw the video online, decided to check and see if it was real, and now that you know I have powers you want to worship me?”  His eyes narrowed in distrust.  “You took t̕w̢o̵ ͝d͟ays͟ to decide that you wanted to be my followers?”  Something was off about that, though, there couldn’t possibly be enough intent from even the five of them to summon him from somewhere outside of Amity, and it sounded like they weren’t even near Amity from the lack of screaming outside.  What offer could they have to summon him from this far away?

“No, no my lord!  You misunderstand!”  The man held up his hands and bowed again, though not as low this time.  “We have watched ever since you defeated the old king and took his place.  We have been devoted to you this whole time, but only now have we been able to call out to you.”  One of the stronger summonings from that first day the video had been out he assumed.  Something still bothered him, though…

“How did you call me here exactly?  Only two other summons have been answered so far, and they were both still in Amity.”  And what was that smell?

“When our lord did not answer our first call, we realized that we had nothing of true significance to offer you.  This time,” he gestured to the offering beneath Danny’s floating feet that the ghost boy had been ignoring up until now.  “we offer you something worthwhile.  This nonbeliever’s life force we offer in exchange for becoming knights in your court when we ascend to the Spirit World.”

Danny looked down and nearly retched at the sight.  There was a girl, only a year or so older than him at best, cut and bleeding out on the circle that was glowing brighter with each drop spilled.  That was why he had been pulled so strongly to this summoning, that was why he was feeling a rush of power even though he hadn’t made a deal, and it was why his vision was going redder than the blood.  “Y̛o͞u ba̴şt́a͠r̛d̶s̕ ̸s̶a͞c͠ri͢f̴iced an͘ inno̴ce̕n̸t ͘ģi̷r͠l to sum͘m͠on a͢ ̶h̵eró th̛at̴ y͏o̧u ҉w̷an͢t ͝to b͝é t̵he ̵f̶o͟l͢l̸o̴w̨e͏rs̸ o̧f͏?̵”  The temperature of the room dropped thirty degrees at once and the candle flames turned blue.  Two of the cultists looked like they realized just how bad of a mistake they had made.

“Does this sacrifice please you, my Prince?”  The lead cultist had a smile on his face that said he was confident he had done everything right and that he was going to get a reward.  The last thing that Fenton heard was Phantom’s distorted voice as red flooded his vision and blood rushed in his ears drowning everything out.

“N̸̶̨̛͘o҉̶͜.͟͏̡́͞"͝ Energy gathered in his hand and he did something he never thought he would.

* * *

 

Tucker had managed to singe the dragon’s tail before the Archer and the Executioner, both still loyal to Aragon, appeared.  Rolling out of the way of an oncoming arrow, Tucker aimed for the bow with his next shot.  The ray was deflected by a glowing green ax that came hurtling towards him quickly after.  Luckily, Mrs. Fenton’s ecto staff blocked the blade before Tuck could receive an impromptu haircut.

Sam, ever the aggressive fighter, pulled out the ecto energy blade that Tucker made for her and charged forward at the Executioner.  Unfortunately, his ax flew back to him in time to deflect her blade, but he found himself engaged in quite the fight with the goth girl.  She dodged each swing and made a few cuts with every jab and slice of her saber.  Eventually, he nicked her cheek, but lost an arm in the process and retreated into the air.

Mr. Fenton was firing away at Aragon, surprisingly good at dodging fireballs for a man his size, but all that football in college had to pay off somehow.  One shot hit a talon and had the dragon prince falling out of the sky.  “I got him!  Now to take him apart molecule by mole-”  Jack was cut off when Jazz shoved him out of the way of a large blue fireball that got a bit of soot on the Fenton Peeler armor.  “Thanks, Jazzerincess.”

“Anytime Dad, but please try to save the bragging for after the ghost is in the thermos.”  She fired off a shot from the peeler as she spoke, not wanting to let Aragon get in another fireball.  Tucker soon found his blaster and started shooting at the dragon’s wings as well, and Jazz started running to try and get his amulet.  “Who has a thermos ready?”

“Sam usually has it since I dropped it that one time.”  Tuck rolled behind a tree and braced himself against the trunk as a car was flung in his direction and nearly took the tree down.  “I mean it’s not like I’ve gotten better with my grip or anything.”

“Exactly, did you see how easily your ecto pistol was shot out of your hand?”  Ducking and sidestepping another swing of the ax since the ghost shrunk a bit and regrew the lost limb, Sam brought up her sword and blocked the next blow, driving the heel of her steel bottomed combat boot into the Executioner’s chest and effectively knocking him back.  “If you had a better grip it would have stayed in your hand.”

“If it stayed in my hand the arrow would have pierced it clean through Sam.”  Tuck spared a couple of shots to help out Mrs. Fenton, who was dealing with the Archer using her staff to deflect the arrows at an almost inhuman speed.  His shots interrupted the flow of arrows just long enough that the Archer had to use his bow as a staff instead.  “I’d prefer not to be weaponless against such archaic enemies, thank you very much.”

“And that time Johnny yanked the gun right out of your hand?”  Another swing and the ghost backed off again, finally going with ghost rays, though they were weak enough to block with her saber.  “Can you blame that on wanting it intact?”

“No, I can blame it on wanting the same of my arms instead of getting ripped off by a speeding motorcycle.”  Just as Tucker lined up a good shot at the amulet, a giant white and purple wolf lunged at him, knocking him to the ground and throwing off his aim considerably.  “Oh come on!  I thought we dealt with this one the first time Johnny came out of the portal!”  A well-placed shot to the face knocked a fang loose and gave Tuck the chance to crawl away from the wolf ghost and keep firing.  “Down fido.”

“Looks like you guys could use a little help.”  A familiar, if muffled, voice called out and was followed by violet detailed grenades blowing up in Aragon’s face.  The dragon roared, far beyond the limit required for human words, and swung at her with his talons.  He missed the speeding hoverboard by a mile and had some scales blasted off of him for his trouble.  “Alright scale boy, what are you doing here in my town?”

Another roar, followed by a swipe of the tail that no one really paid any mind until it was in their face and Valerie was being caught by her board in front of the others, who had backed up to regroup.  The ghosts all looked ready to murder them and eat the corpses as they floated and crawled forward, a pair of animalistic growls the only warning before they all lunged as one.

They were ten feet away when the rings appeared and suddenly everyone could see their breath.  Tucker and Sam had to catch their breath when they saw that the halfa prince that appeared had sharp red eyes and was surrounded by whipping winds of cold.  “Stand behind me.”  It was an order spoken with enough venom that even Valerie was backing up in the air a bit.  She narrowed her eyes and opened her mouth to yell at him but his breath beat hers.

All the air rushed towards his mouth as he inhaled, and Tucker was reminded of how the tide felt when it pulled back towards the ocean, just before one of the really big waves came.  These waves came as sound and power.  Just as Aragon loosed another fireball, Danny unleashed the biggest Wail they had ever seen, waves of green and even a bit of blue ripping through the air, tearing up pavement and pushing back the other ghosts with a force unlike any other.  It lasted longer than usual, as though Danny were vomiting emotion as energy, and it was shaking the ground and air around him.  The eye of Aragon’s amulet cracked and the cracks splintered out to the gold casing from one wave, the second shattering the trinket all together, and the rest slamming into the shrinking and weak ex-prince hard enough to send him flying with the others.  The ax bent, the bow splintered and the wolf whimpered in pain as it hit a wall that crumbled from the force.

When he was finally done, Danny sucked all of them into his thermos, looking exhausted with his eyes back to green and his aura back to white.  He faded from the visible spectrum and flew straight to Sam’s house like they had planned for whenever a big ghost fight happened and he needed an excuse for not being there.  When he got to the room and transformed back into human, Danny raced to her bathroom and emptied his stomach of all it’s contents.


	6. Comfort, Magic, Learning, Reflecting, Raging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm editing these, as you know. I changed a bit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Team Phantom, Elle, Val, the Pates, and then we also still have Vlad.
> 
> Shall we?!

When Sam, Tucker, and Jazz had reached Sam's house - the elder Fenton sibling having convinced her parents to go home and check to make sure Danny was ok - they were greeted by the smell of bile and an aura of regret. It was so strong that all three of them knew that Danny had developed a new power. Unfortunately, it wasn't a time of celebration over a new power. Jazz called her parents and told them that Danny was at the Mansons' place and that he wanted to stay over, feeling a bit under the weather. Danny was in the bathroom, curled up in a ball and hugging his middle. The teen shook, and the scent of puke sharpened by the cold that filled the room. It took longer than it should have for him to register the sound of his best friends and sister entering the room. By the time he did, there were already black combat boots on the plush purple throw rug he was laying on. He muttered something that could have been 'Hey Sam' but really, Danny wasn't sure himself what he had said. The image of a dead girl laying in a pool of blood that he had been able to _taste_ before he could smell it flashed before his eyes every time he closed them, and he was so tired. Two pairs of strong arms, one pale and one dark, lifted him up by his shoulders and legs and carried him to Sam's bed. He was set down and felt the familiar weight of his best friends settle next to him.

"Jazz," he heard Tucker say, "I'm staying here with Danny and Sam, okay? I know you're gonna join too, but you should work up an alibi for Danny and tell your parents first." Danny could practically - or maybe literally, he couldn't say at the moment - feel hs sister scowling at his best buddy, but he knew the tone that Tucker was taking with her. He was making a plan using logic and emotion at the same time, and no one would be able to convince him he was wrong - not with Danny mentally incapacitated like this anyway. "Jack and Maddie," _well shit, I must be in the shittiest possible mood if he's using their first names_ , "are going to come here to check on him and if you don't intercept them then they'll see him like this and Danny doesn't need them hovering and asking a thousand questions right now. You know this."

Jazz glared at her second brother - because that's what Tucker was to her now, after all of these years - and crossed her arms. This was ridiculous. That was _her_ little brother sandwiched between the goth and the geek. She should be the one to stay and comfort him, not Tucker and Sam. But eventually her logical side won out over her emotional one, and she saw that Tucker wasn't going to budge on this and it was Sam's house. "Fine," she growled out and turned to the door. "I'll go and weave a little lie for Mom and Dad but when I get back there had better be room in that bed for me." She was answered in the most unexpected way; Tucker took off his shirt and tossed it at her, smacking the frazzled psychologist-to-be in the face.

Danny looked up to see what Tucker had done with his shirt and felt the corners of his lips twitch up from a frown to a more neutral expression. He felt Sam do the same behind him and sighed, burying his face in Tucker's shoulder. Danny wasn't up for laughing, even if it was funny. He could still smell the scent of burning flesh mixed with blood as he dialed 911 using the girl's phone. If he hadn't emptied his stomach entirely already, he would have thrown up right there on Tucker.

"You know what you need right now, Danny?" Sam muttered into the silence after a few moments, a finger tracing over the scars that littered his body. He looked up, and she offered a small smile. "You need popcorn and a space documentary. Tucker?" The techno geek met her gaze with a scowl before letting out a sigh and nodding. He slowly dislodged himself from the disturbed ghost boy's hold and got out of the bed, heading for the door. Danny turned over and pulled her into a hug, muttering something about butter. "Got any particular documentaries in mind, NASA boy?" Sam leaned over to her nightstand as best as she could while not slipping out of Danny's arms. She pulled out a collection of DVDs that she had refused to part with, no matter how many times Tucker called them retro.

When Tuck made it back to the room with a giant bucket of popcorn, he found Danny picking up a Space Odyssey DVD and taking off his shirt. "Oh good, I thought I was gonna have to get Sam to help me strip you for movie cuddling." Danny snorted at that and handed the goth the DVD he had picked out while the geek settled back into his place in the bed. "You're such a nerd; you know that?"

"Geek..." Danny found himself to be uncharacteristically of few words. Still, getting him to talk about anything right now was what they needed to do, so Sam set her sound system notably lower than usual, and started the movie once she was back in bed. The two wrapped an arm around Danny, and he returned the gesture. It had been forever since the three of them sat down and watched old movies together, and longer still since Danny had let himself be visibly vulnerable around his friends. It felt... well it wasn't nice to be forced into this situation by the current circumstances, but when Jazz walked in and butted her way into the cuddle pile of teenagers, Danny felt more... Right.

* * *

 

When Elle appeared back in front of Mama Zee, her lessons continued as though they hadn't been interrupted. The Shaman didn't even comment on the dark green stripe that now went through her newest pupil's hair - both in her bangs and down her ponytail. " _You have a great potential to tap into the energies of the world, Danielle. All you need to know is how to do it._ " It wasn't as hard as one would assume for the one-year-old homunculus to learn Portuguese. There was just something about languages that Elle understood. It was likely a ghost thing. " _Which hand is your dominant one, child?_ " Elle raised her right hand, and Mama Zee took her left. " _Place this hand on the ground and close your eyes. Clear your mind, and open your Eye._ " Thanks to lessons from several other mystics in South America, Elle had gotten rather adept at opening her third eye. Instead of looking at the shaman, whose aura was shining like a star, the half-blood looked down at herself. She saw a mix of greens swirling around like the gasses of a galaxy - the ectoplasmic energy of her ghost half. But that wasn't all that she could see. Her core was deep inside of her when she was human, harder to feel. This was something closer to the surface of her aura, something small and round. It was in her center, in her physical core. It sat between her lungs and just under her heart, and it beat in tune with her pulse.

She reached with her mind and dug deep into herself, noting that either Mama Zee had stopped speaking or she was concentrating too deeply inward to hear her. Finally, she touched the ball of pink light and felt _GrowthChangeFreedomBurningEnergy_ and reeled back. Becoming aware of her physical senses so suddenly, Elle flailed her arms about and fell back onto the hard ground and soft grass. She blinked and looked up at Mama Zee's grinning face. " _What was **that**?"_

" _That, my child, is the core of your power. I had a feeling that an intuitive and self-conscious girl like yourself would look inward first._ " The old shaman chuckled as her student righted herself into the lotus position. " _What you felt is your life energy, what many of we magic folk call Mana nowadays. Some call it Prana or Qi, or even Quintessence. Me? I call it what it really is."_ She pointed to the spot between her ribs in the center of her chest, and Elle was able to see the energy pulsating at that focused point. " _I call it Life. It's your second heart, what you felt inside. The part of you where all of your life energy pools up and flows from like streams. With Time, those streams can become rivers, and that pool can become an ocean."_

Elle thought about what her mentor was telling her for a moment, breathing slowly as she processed the information. She knew by now that energy flowed through the body along currents much like veins and the nervous system. It worked that way for ghosts, and that's what she saw whenever she looked at a significantly energetic human being. She never imagined that humans had their own form of core for magic, though. " _Right, okay. There's a ball of magic in my body that can grow stronger like any organ, right?_ " Mama Zee nodded, understanding the girl's need to put things into a slightly scientific perspective. " _But that's not entirely what this lesson is about. You were telling me about drawing power from the earth._ "

" _Your in-dominant hand is your receptive one. Energy can flow in through that hand easier than it would through the dominant one - which is the projective hand."_ Mama Zee placed a hand on the ground, and Elle opened her Eye just in time to see what looked like pink lightning surge up from the earth into her mentor. The shaman then took Elle's left hand in her right, and the sparks flowed into her, surging through her body. " _See if you can't try to pull some of the energy that I'm projecting into yourself._ " Zee retracted her hand but kept her palm opened to Elle. The ghost girl's hand reached out to the elder woman's a bit, but that wasn't the true reaching. Elle's mind shot out and grasped onto the light pouring from Zee's hand. She was struck by the feeling of _FlowingJaggedSurgingElectricSparkingPulsingEnergy_ and was flung back by the amount of power she drew in.

When she looked up, Elle noted that Mama Zee was holding onto the ground and tendrils of energy that were visible even to the naked eye were flowing into her body. " _You're hurt._ "

" _I am old, little one._ " Mama Zee chuckled and shook her head. " _When you get as old as me, you get used to a little hurt now and then. You are stronger than I anticipated, to be able to handle as much power as you did. Now,_ " she grasped Elle's hand as soon as the girl was within reach again. " _Reach down into the ground, deeper and deeper, as far as you can. See if you can touch the current._ "

* * *

 

When Valerie got back to her apartment, she hovered in through the window and retracted her suit as soon as she was over the bed. It was strange, the feeling that her new suit gave her. It was still there, somewhere, she knew that. It was like her suit turned into a bunch of microbots that retreated into her skin and body when she willed it away, and there was a constant buzzing in her ears that reminded her that it was there. That ghost who did this to her, merged her with her ghost hunting tech, he had taken the paths before her and destroyed the way to an easier, normal life. She would never be able to truly take off her armor now. Was she even still entirely human, or was she some cyborg?

"Now is not the time for teenage hero angsting," Val muttered to herself as she rose up into a sitting position on her bed. After a little stretch to pop the kinks out of her back, Valerie went over to her computer, firing it up and thinking back to the ghost fight. Phantom had been different when he finally got there. The fact that he was late showing up was odd in and of itself, but the lack of stupid jokes or actual fighting was a different kind of weird. After he had used that scream attack that sent shivers down the young ghost hunter's spine, she was able to see his face as he captured the downed spooks. His eyes were glowing brighter than they normally did, and they were glowing red instead of green.

As her old computer finally booted up and she logged onto the internet, Valerie went searching for any references to Phantom's eyes being red. Normally they were green; she knew that for a fact. Typically, he was cracking wise and shooting at his opponents when they got angry and sloppy because of his incessant mouth. _Phantom, red eyes._

The first result was a blog that got a lot of hits. "Well, the news is usually just a bunch of lies anyway." Clicking on the link with the thought of people being more honest online where no one could see their face, Val scanned over the article with as open a mind as she could manage.

 _Everyone who says that he's a villain or a psychopath always brings up the bank robberies and the mayor, so let me show you something that everyone has seen._ Under it was a picture of Phantom covered in stolen jewelry and a gold crown. _We've all seen the picture, it was all over the news, but did anyone ever really look at it? Look at his eyes, they aren't green like they usually are, they're red_.' It's true… _'Frederich Isak Showenhower, aka Freakshow, the ringmaster of Circus Gothica was apprehended later that week and shown to have several ghosts mind controlled and under his power working for him. Yeah, I know, it sounds ridiculous but hear me out. The crystal ball on the end of that staff of his looked pretty suspicious and did anyone notice?_ Another picture, one of Freakshow, then a pair of them side by side with his staff and Phantom's picture. _It's the same red glow! Phantom is a hero and was being controlled!_

"Huh... ghostly mind control?" Valerie's mind had been opened up to quite a few things in the past few months; a half ghost clone, ghosts existing, the weirdness that was the ghost world. Mind control wasn't too far of a stretch. "Coulda been photoshopped." She then went back to google images and typed in a new search since all of her newspaper clippings were in black and white. _Phantom bank robberies_. Screencaps of news footage popped up all over the screen, and she saw that he did indeed have dark crimson eyes when he was stealing things.

Her next search was on books by Showenhower, and she found a huge collection of them on ghostly artifacts, methods for exorcism, how to befriend a ghost even. So, Valerie downloaded the ebook version of the oldest book that was digitized and got to reading. It was more productive than thinking about how her suit affected her humanity, or how terrifying it actually was to see Phantom's power unleashed. _The sound of a hundred thousand million damned and tortured souls crying out for freedom, justice, vengeance; crying out in pain, in sorrow, in Fury, each scream infinitely louder than the next_. This was less likely to make her go crazy, and besides; learning a bit on how human world objects could affect ghosts would help her in her job.

* * *

 

After Rick's boxing match, the teen was sporting a black eye and a wide grin. As his parents heard him and his twin into the SUV, George cheered him on like the supportive brother he was. "... and with a killer right hook, it's Richard Pate for the win! Down goes his opponent and the victory dinner goes to Pate!" He imitated the sound of a crowd going wild, and Rick wrapped an arm around the other's shoulder.

"Alright," their mother Raven laughed, "Who wants the breakfast for dinner of champions?"

"I do!" Rick's hand shot up, and so did George's, the two of them speaking in sync for the fiftieth time that week. "Waffles and sausages for the conquering Pates!"

"Who's the baddest family in town?" Josh, their father, turned to flash them his usual wry grin, holding up a hand for high fives.

"Pates! Pates! Pates! Pates!" George started, and Rick joined in with the chant as the car headed down the street.

After a moment, Josh calmed the boys down a bit and brought up something they hadn't thought about once they had gotten to the boxing ring. "So, I saw online that you guys have figured out how to summon a spirit using a circle." The statement made them pause in their celebration, and George nodded in confirmation. "You know that's dangerous as hell, right?"

"We were summoning a superhero, Dad." George immediately defended their position. That Valerie Gray girl had already tried to get at them about how dangerous it was to summon a ghost and George was the one to do the talking. "Phantom wouldn't have hurt us."

"Unless he was in the middle of a fight and about to fire off an ectoblast when you called to him." That brought a frown to both boys' faces, and the blond continued speaking. "Plus, what if that Phantom kid is an old ghost with a less than pleasant family? You could have accidentally called up his angry son, or villainous father. You shouldn't perform any rituals like that without supervision. I saw the video, and I noticed that there were literally no forms of mystic protection that you guys set up in the case of an event like that." Josh's tone was growing steadily sterner and the high spirits of winning the match were fading just as quickly. "If I didn't have the house warded, you two could have gotten hurt."

"Wait, warded?" Rick perked up and raised a brow, wincing immediately since it aggravated his black eye. "You mean like, magical protection barriers to keep bad things out?"

"To keep anything specified in the raising of the wards out really," Josh shrugged. "But that's not the point. I wasn't made aware that you summoned a spirit until it hit the internet. I don't like that."

"Neither do I, boys." Raven piped up and turned her emerald gaze from the road to her kids in the back seat for a moment as she stopped at the red light. "Next time you do anything magical, you come to us, understand? I don't want it backfiring on you because you don't know what you're doing."

"Does this mean you're going to give us lessons in magic?" George raised a hand as though they were at school, and their parents shared a look. After a moment of silent communication, Raven turned her attention to the road, and Josh turned back with a grin.

"Maybe."

* * *

 

When Vlad got back to his office in Amity Park, he was expecting to sit down with some tea and relax with Maddie as he read the paper after a long and annoying business trip.  What he did not expect was to look in the paper and see the headline ‘Twin Teens Summon Ghostly Hero’ on the front page.  

“ _ Local twins George and Richard Pate discover a way to contact the town’s resident ghostly hero with the use of methods that Richard says he was surprised no one tried before as so much as a joke.  ‘A bit of Latin, some chalk, some candles and blood, and all you need is creativity and willpower,’ says the one who came up with the idea as a joke, Richard. _  A pair of fourteen-year-olds thought to dabble in the occult eh?  And it worked!”  Vlad gave his fluffy cat a couple of scratches behind the ears, enjoying the way her warm fur felt against his hand as she purred.  “ _ ‘There’s at least two things that are obvious about Phantom that we can make a drawing of,’ says young George, though he refused to answer when asked what two things he meant.  Below is an image of the summoning circle used and the chant that called forth the spectral savior. _  Truly, Maddie, they make this too easy sometimes.”  He chuckled and wondered just how he would use this.  Something to think on for later, though it did strike him as odd when he saw that the symbols used were Ice and a crown.  Surely that was why none of the next summons worked; it was incomplete.  This would take some looking into.

The billionaire rose up and prepared to head to his laptop when the sudden hot flash of his ghost sense told him that something was in his house that was not supposed to be.  “Oh, what is it now?”  The cat jumped out of his hands as black rings wrapped around his being and transformed him into his aesthetically vampiric ghost form.  By the time he had gotten to the vault where he had kept his stolen artifacts of ghostly power, however, it had already been pried open, and the ghost’s ecto-signature was gone.  When he looked around carefully, however, he saw that it wasn’t the only thing that was gone.  “Now who would possibly be so stupid as to steal _my_ Crown of Fire?”  Vlad seethed in rage and soared straight for his portal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is fun to rewrite, I must say. I can redefine plot lines, make it so that characters are interacting better, and just.... actually follow some kind of plot. it still leads up to what it leads up to but i want it to be BETTER than before.


	7. Friday news, trips, and tricks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A plot bunny is born, and angst has been delivered along with some doubt

Tucker, being the beyond savvy person he was, knew how to set up a good security system. That said, he was still only human and overlooked a few things. For instance, he hadn't thought that anyone but Vlad would try to get into the Fenton's security system. So, he hadn't put as much security as he could have when they decided that the Fenton Security System wasn't as secure a software protection program as it could have been. Checking on the system activity when he woke up in the middle of the night at Sam's house, he saw that this had been a mistake. "Those guys are startin to give me a headache..." He would have been afraid that the light would wake up Sam or Danny, but the space-obsessed ghost boy was sleeping like a log, and the Goth was not someone who woke up easily. Switching his display to nighttime mode, he got to work on setting up a harder to break through encryption. A good half hour later and Sam's alarm was going off to tell her there was an hour before school and she needed to eat. Looking over his work, Tucker grinned at the back doors that he had set up through a few proxies to get into the Pate's site and through there, their system, along with the tripled security set in place for the files on the Fenton Computers. "You're good boys, but I keep the government from knowing about Danny."

* * *

 

Few in the Spirit World knew where everyone else's lairs were. After all, with the power of flight, a ghost or spirit could be a hundred miles away from their home, and you wouldn't know it until they showed you. Fewer still knew about the lair of spirits like the Fright Knight. Fright was a hoary spirit, having served Pariah in the war between Spirits and Ghost, and he was a force to be reckoned. Thus, no one ever questioned where such a being might reside.  It was perfectly safe, therefore, to store the crown of his king in his chambers away from Plasmius.  With the Crown of Fire hidden away, Fright could focus on the other task that was laid before him.  Even if Phantom was not the true King, Fright could feel an obligation to at least try to fulfill his duties to the Prince.  "Nightmare!  We to the Celestial Sea."  That was where the last half-breeds were rumored to have found sanctuary: amongst the most powerful types of Spirits.

* * *

 

Some things could startle you, things that could surprise you, things that could outright shock you into confusion and disbelief.  This was not one of those things.  When George looked at his phone and saw the news article that said that a cult had sprung up and tried something like what they did he was beyond words.  Some teenager called the police, but when they got there, all they found were men in robes and a girl in a circle of chalk that had bled out before they got there.  There were scorch marks on the robes, and one of them had ice encasing their hand, a hand that couldn’t exactly be saved since they couldn’t find anything strong enough to break through the ice or get it to melt.  The girl was seventeen and a cheerleader named Sadie and she had been killed in cold blood so that they could ‘call forth their Lord Phantom and pledge themselves to him.'  It made the freshmen’s blood boil, and the milk in George's hand at lunch was actually bubbling up with heat.  The two were too busy seething to notice.  George shoved his phone into his pocket, unaware of the discoloration in his eyes, and stood up.

“What are you doing?”  Rick was pissed, several curses in a few languages at the tip of his tongue, but he was still the reason between the two of them, and he wasn’t sure what his brother would do in this state. George had a tendency to do stupid things when he was upset.  “George, where are you going?”

“I’m kinda tired of having an internet war with them, and if something else happens, I’m going to need some smash therapy,” the words were said through gritted teeth as he started towards the table of a particular group of sophomores.  “So, I decided to talk to them like an average person to take my mind off of what I just read.  Care to join me?”

“A Pate giving up the battle?”  Rick joked as he picked up his tray and followed toward the table, an action that went surprisingly unnoticed.  “Unthinkable.”

“Hardly, I’m just getting to know the enemy in case I need to make them my allies.”  George calmly set his tray down across from Tucker and Rick took his seat next to him, facing Danny.  Neither was brave enough to sit directly in front of Sam.  After sipping his suddenly cooled back down milk, George waved at the quiet and confused looking upperclassmen.  “Hi.”

“Uh, hey?”  Well, at least Danny put on a real clueless act.  “What are you, uh, doing here?”  It wasn’t asked accusingly; he genuinely wanted to know, though he could take a guess, and Rick smiled as George seemed to map the guy’s face out. Danny wasn't in any mood to be talking to these guys today, or anyone besides Sam and Tuck, but he couldn't avoid school and acting aggressive would draw attention to him.

“I’m Rick, the nerd here is George-”

“I am a geek, not a nerd, thank you very much boxing briefs.”

“- and we thought we might sit with you guys.  Expand our friend circle, ya know?”

“Do you even know anything about us?”  Sam had a nice heavy layer of suspicion in her voice, and George visibly cringed at it because that was a horrible way to keep a secret.

“Not really, but that’s what approaching someone and talking to them is for.” Rick held out his hand and waited for one of them to shake it.  Realizing that neither of his friends seemed all that willing, Danny stepped up to be the civil one, as usual, and shook the hand presented.

“Nice to meet you, I’m Danny.  You’ve got cool highlights.”

* * *

 

Elle bowed respectfully to Mama Zee and checked that her bag was full. " _Thank you, Mama Zee, for the lessons. I will treasure and try to expand upon them in my travels._ "

" _May the Earth support you, and the Winds guide you, my child._ " The shaman nodded and gave a friendly wave. " _Stay safe and help those who need it._ "

" _A lesson that my brother taught me well before I left."_ Elle nodded and walked away, muttering to herself. "And it's time I go and pay him a visit. Besides, I have a Deal to follow through on." Once she was sure that Mama Zee couldn't physically see her - she knew that the shaman knew what she was, it was merely an instinct to take precautions - rings of light wrapped around her and Elle Phantom soared through the jungle air, a stripe of pink bringing color to her stark white locks.

* * *

 

“And of course, the dork hits his head on the edge of the lake trying to swim back.”  Rick responded with the sunniest of grins to the dark glare his brother was giving him.  “Wasn’t hard enough to be bad but he was seein mermaids the whole way back home.”

“It was starfish, first of all,” George took a bitter bite out of his sandwich as Tucker and Danny laughed at the story.  “Secondly, it wore off after like five minutes; I just decided to take a nap.”

Sam snorted and rolled up the bag her lunch had come in since she refused to eat the fake food of the cafeteria.  “So, what do you two do in your spare time?”

“I swim, do some fun tech stuff,” George’s eyes flicked over to Tucker, whose brow raised in amusement and surprise.  “And I look for cryptids in the woods.”

“I make sure he eats and cleans himself at least twice a week,” getting a shove the monocled twin laughed and hooked his arm around his brother’s shoulder.  “I also box, read up on Latin and go cryptid hunting with this nut.”

“We aren’t hunting for th-”

“Yeah yeah,” Rick waved off the correction and leaned in with a grin.  “He looks for monsters, and I come prepared to deal with them.”

“Monsters huh?”  Sam raised a brow as Danny tensed and grasped his hand with hers under the table to give it a reassuring squeeze.  “Such as?”

“Windigos, werewolves, maybe a naiad in the water.”  George shrugged and slid on a big smile.  “I swear, we almost saw one this one time we went to Lake Michigan, but dad interrupted us.”

“We’re also the ones who came up Phantom’s summoning circle.”  George raised a brow at his twin while Rick kept his eyes on the trio, watching for any tells.  Tucker’s jaw clenched, Sam’s eyes narrowed a bit and Danny… froze.   He had been about to take the last bite of his donut, and now it was just hanging there in his hand in front of his mouth.  “In retrospect, I should have realized that it’d turn into a mess, but we were kinda caught up in all the excitement.  Did you guys try to summon him?”

“No,” Danny put his donut back into the bag.  “No, we didn’t, because we know better than to bug the town hero for no reason.”  His voice had changed, there was a sharp accusation in it that had Rick feeling a bit worse than he was about his lapse in foresight.

“Yeah well…” George started, trying to save face out of pure instinct, even though he knew it was a bad move with all that had happened.  “We thought that people would have some kind of sense not to all try it at once.  We just wanted to let everyone know how to contact him in case they had something special they wanted to say to Phantom, you know?  A way to help people say thanks.”

Tucker’s expression softened somewhat, but Danny still looked sickened.  Sam, though, she was glowering at them as though they had slapped her grandmother.  When she spoke, it was low and dangerous in a way that had Rick tensing up to defend his brother if need be.  “Someone died the other day because a cult of crazy people thought that ‘their Lord Phantom’ would like the power that a sacrifice would give him because they learned how to call on him.”

The cafeteria, full of body heat and the warmth of everyone’s breath, suddenly felt cold, the same as the twins’ blood.  George however, felt a slow building anger and the drinks on the table all started to bubble and boil with it.  “We know, we read.  Are you trying to say that we’re the cause of it?”  George’s fake glass cup was starting to shake from some unseen pressure.  “Are you saying that it’s our fault that she died?  That it’s our fault that those lunatics thought to murder someone?”  Tucker’s eyes were on the bubbling drinks, Danny was keeping an eye out for them, but neither was about to interrupt as George’s cup started to crack.

“It wouldn’t have happened if the information hadn’t gotten onto the inter-”

“'Êtes-vous stupides, putain?”  Rick’s hand had a nice meeting with the tabletop as his voice rose a bit.  “I’m amazed no one in  _ this _ putain town figured it out a year ago and tried it!  It would have gotten around eventually!”

“This is _not our fault_!”  The cup finally broke, and it’s contents spilled out all over the table, but no one at said table batted an eye.  “We didn’t know that cults even existed until now, how were we supposed to know this would happen?”

Danny’s eyes looked different suddenly, brighter like they were glowing.  Those fiery blue eyes stared right into both pairs across from them, and a voice of authority only a few people in the cafeteria had ever heard from Danny Fenton told them, “Sit down.”  It was an order, spoken slowly and quietly, but an order none the less.  The twins sat, and the drinks all stilled, the utensils in the cafeteria no longer floating.  “No, this is not your fault,” a side glare to Sam that cut off whatever comment she had.  “But it’d be a big help to us and everyone if you took the video down.”

The brothers took in deep and shaking breaths for a moment before Rick pulled out his phone and got to work on the site.  George grabbed some napkins and a slice of bread, tossing the bread on the plastic shards before picking it up and dabbing at the spilled milk.  Tucker’s voice cut through the tense silence that had come over all the nearby tables as well as theirs.  “So, what was that exactly, with the cup?”

“Don’t know.”  George finished cleaning up and walked over to a trashcan, depositing his lunch and trash before coming back to sit in the deafening silence.  “Never happened before.  Rick?”

“Never…”  after a few more taps of his phone, the boxer put his phone away with a sigh.  “Removed and deleted.  I just hope that they were the only crazies who would think to try something like that.”  He glared across at the raven haired boy when Danny snorted at the words.  “What?”

“Don’t you know that when you make a wish like that, Fate decides to fuck with you?”  The bell rang to signal the end of lunch, though it sounded far more foreboding than that.


	8. Angsty Teens are Angstier When Dead

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the title of this chapter says it all, I swear. angst all around my dudes. after all, I couldn't abandon this scene, just cause I wanted to improve a few parts of it.

Madeline Fenton was nothing if not an excellent researcher; it was part of the reason why she and her husband had been able to figure out half of what they had, Vlad or no Vlad. And though she knew that Jack was almost as good at researching as she was, he preferred libraries and books for research, and while they had their merit, she was better at looking on the internet. She had developed a 3D holographic program for blueprints and designs a month ago. "Using 3D holographic program to ensure so-called summoning symbols are correct," Maddie reported.

Jack took up the narration: "Drawing necessary symbols and summoning circle. All symbols present in successful summoning circles. Lighting wax candles placed on borders of the circle." He nearly knocked a candle over in his excitement. They were using it to go over various symbols that she had found, along with ones that Jack had, and together they made sure that they got everything just right. Jack took the chalk and drew out the symbols that they found and the circle that worked for Phantom in the center of the lab, wax candles placed all around it. They had spent a day and a half on this; they weren't going to let a poorly done setting ruin it.

"Blood is the last necessary ingredient in the summoning. Both Jack and I will add our blood to the ceremony to increase our chances of success." Maddie let out a breath to calm her anticipation. Maddie pricked her finger, and Jack did the same, the couple finding it the best time to try something like this since the kids were all out of the house at the Nasty Burger and the library. The blood hit the chalk, and Maddie eagerly chanted the Latin. They would have this ghost yet.

* * *

Far from her apartment in an Elmerton warehouse converted to her home-base, Valerie Grey finished the summoning circle for Phantom. There were store bought candles lit all around it, and the circle had a little something extra. The crown was at the top right of the circle - though Val wasn't sure she wanted to think about the implications of it being part of Phantom's circle - and the snowflake on the upper left. At the bottom was a feather, something that she hoped would help attract his attention.

Thinking up a symbol to represent Danielle was a bit of a challenge since they didn't get to know each other that well, but something that meant freedom simply felt right. A feather was fitting since the ghost girl seemed to look the freest and jubilant in the skies. "If this works, I'll have to find a way to thank Danielle."

It had taken research, looking into every little detail and legend that she could find, but Valerie had finally come to the conclusion that she was wrong about Phantom. A spirit who's eyes were not always red would only have that crimson gaze when something horrible happened that disturbed them to the core. This usually meant 'something happened, and they're pissed off all the way to the center of their souls' from what Val could tell.

Valerie knew that what she was doing was the right thing, really she did now, but that didn't make it any easier. It was easier to just go back to hating him, act like none of this happened, or even just not shoot at him when she saw him. No, she had to do this. Valerie wouldn't be able to look herself in the mirror if she stopped now. Regardless of how uncomfortable she was, she was in the wrong, and if a little awkwardness was the price for admitting that to the one she had wronged, then so be it.

Pressing an antighost knife to the back of her hand, Valerie hesitated, the blade biting but not breaking her skin. Steeling herself, she sliced her flesh open and let the blood drop onto the circle as she spoke apprehensively. "Magna heroicarum gelidus regem …

* * *

"We were going through the day as usual," Danny explained slowly to Jazz. They met up with her at the library and sat in the most secluded part of the building with Tucker on his left and Sam next to Jazz. "And the day had been going pretty well. I even practiced my Empathy powers and got Dash to fuck off as soon as he made eye contact with me. But then those twins - the ones that went and blabbed about how to summon me to the entire internet - came up to our table and sat down and started talking to us. I tried to make nice."

"And I eventually went along with it since Danny was making nice," Tucker chimed in with a frown. "Honestly, I wanted to punch them both for the trouble they caused. They even managed to hack into Fenton Works before I went in and beefed the security up a bit this morning. The two of them have touched basically every file you have on ghosts - don't worry, the ones on halfas are safe. I made sure that any files regarding information that would identify you as you would be as secure as my own computers."

"At some point," Sam continued, glaring darkly at the air above Tucker's head, as though she could hurt the Pates with a look from afar. "One of them pointed out that they were the ones to figure the whole Summoning thing out and then things got weird."

Tucker leaned forward with his hands forming a finger tent. "After Sam antagonized them-"

" _They_ antagonized _me_ when they brought this bullshit into my best friend's life."

"-George's eyes started glowing gold." He continued as though she hadn't spoken, something he knew would aggravate her further. "Like, miniature suns gold. The milk in his cup began to boil and then the cup exploded."

"The utensils in the cafeteria were also ignoring gravity as much as a ghost does." Danny hummed in thought, trying to concentrate on the events of Lunch time, not the day before. "Sam accused them of being at fault for Sadie's death and then it felt like the entire cafeteria was just thrust into an oven. At least to me. Also," Danny pulled open his green button up and lifted his undershirt to reveal a black rose etched into his skin, similarly to how the cloud appeared on his forehead like a birthmark. "This appeared over my heart at some point, and I'm not sure when it was. This is the symbol on my circle that represents Sam, guys."

"You've passed another trial of being the ghost king it seems," Sam hummed, distracted from her plan of strangling Tucker by the mention of her symbol. "Each symbol is supposed to represent a trait that the king has to have. I went through my books while you guys fell asleep and found some mentions of the trials of the King of the Dead." She reached into her spider backpack and pulled out a black book with purple writing on the front of it. Knowledge of the Netherworld. "Each King had a different set of symbols, and they were different because each ruler saw the same traits in different people close to them."

"Which means that whatever tra-" Danny cut himself off with a groan of pain, his skull throbbing with the sudden force of wills that called to him. His form flickered between human and ghost, and emotions that weren't his whirled within is mind. " _The summons_ are _too strong; I can't ignore them both!_ " The halfa hissed and dug his hands into his hair. The pulls came from two different directions. One _confusionregretanxiety_ and the other _intriguemalicefacinationkill_ and both were extremely determined. " _One of them is different, and not in a good way_."

"How do you mean Danny?" Sam had checked out a book from the Skulk and Lurk on spiritual summonings and rituals as well and was looking through to see what could be considered bad for the spirit in question; difficult to do since most don't consider that sort of thing. "Is it another sacrifice?"

The reminder nearly had the hero throwing up his Nasty Burger as an unwelcome coppery taste stung the tip of his tongue. " _No, it… it feels like something was added that's not supposed to be there_." The crackling energy of his transformation rings sparked around his body, waiting to transport him away to the strongest pull if he didn't make a choice soon, and Danny wasn't sure he liked the possibility of what the stronger pull could be.

"Mom and Dad said they'd be looking for a way to summon Phantom and trap him," Jazz placed a hand just over her brother's shoulder, not sure she wanted to know what would happen if he settled on human with her hand in his shoulder. He opened his eyes to show he was still listening, though he was mostly concentrating on the magic. "Danny go to the other one. Whoever it is, they're less likely to be a threat to you."

" _I can see the lab, and I can see a warehouse…_ " There was only one person he could think of that would be doing this at a warehouse, and his eyes widened a bit at that realization, shifting from blue to bright toxic green. " _I know who the_ other _summoner is._ " With that, he grabbed onto the invisible string that lead to it and vanished in a flash.

* * *

Val had scrutinized the video and the twins' account of summoning Phantom, and neither mentioned hearing his voice coming from the circle as the icy winds swirled above the chalk, nearly blowing out the candles. There was a flash of light and Phantom appeared, looking as though he were about to fight something. "Valerie Gray, how nice to see you." The halfa dropped his stance in favor of folding his arms and giving the huntress a suspicious look. "You certainly wanted me here badly enough, but the question is why? Does our truce no longer stand?" His sarcastic tone echoed around the room, and Danny felt a strange sense of disturbance. It wasn't his emotion; he knew that much.

"I wanted to talk, and this is faster than flying around town trying to find the most elusive ghost I know." Val wasn't in her armor, and though they both knew that could change in an instant, she hoped it would help her look less threatening at the moment. "How much to have a conversation?" The shock in Phantom's face was a tiny bit insulting. It wasn't as though she couldn't listen to reason or have a civil conversation with someone! She was one of the popular girls before he came into her life, _and_ they had a truce going on still.

_She doesn't even have an offering to start with? That's just informal._ Even hearing his own ghost influenced thoughts about the situation, he knew that the indignation he was feeling wasn't his own. A tilt of his head and a hum of pretend thought that shook the window panes later, and he grinned at her. "A guarantee that you won't hurt me while we talk." He could have said no, but this was probably going to be the only thing keeping him out of his parents' lab since he could still feel the pull of their summons. "I don't feel like getting shot at because you don't like how I respond to something. D͞e͞a̷l̴?͘." He held out his hand, and blue-green energy swirled around it, dancing at his fingertips like a frozen flame.

Valerie stared at the hand presented like it would bite her, something that Danny should have expected of course, before tentatively shaking it. "Deal." The tendrils of energy wrapped around her wrist and crawled up the Huntress' arm before dissipating. "Cold…"

"Yeah well, an ice core does that to you." Danny floated out of the circle, though the symbols still pulsated with soft blue light. He assumed that meant it was tying him there. "So, what did you want to talk about? My favorite color?" The hero's boots touched the ground, and he noticed that Val shifted her hands awkwardly now that he had agreed to stay. The apprehension was back in the air, and it took a bit of concentration not to let a shiver run down his spine. Sympathizing with someone was one thing he could handle. This empathic power, however, was going to take plenty getting used to.

"Well, after the other day when you used that power of yours, whatever it was, I started doing some research." She kept constant eye contact, even if this felt weirder than discovering that ghosts existed in the first place. "Since you asked me to help you rescue Danielle and then followed up on your end of the deal, I had to assume you weren't all bad."

"Gee, thanks." The sarcastic tone in his voice was so thick that Val probably could have cut it with a knife. "It took helping a little girl survive the experiments of a psychopathic homicidal ghost and then offering up to be tortured further than I had been before to move from menace to not-all-bad. Wonder what it takes to be a good guy in your eyes." The words weren't meant to cut as deep into Valerie's wounded pride as they did, but then he didn't know that she had come to the conclusion that she did. "What'd you research, I have to wonder?" Phantom's legs crossed in the air, and he rested his cheek in the palm of his hand.

Taking a deep breath to remind herself that this was how the ghost boy was and that she was doing this to make up for things, the ghost huntress tried giving Phantom a pacifying look. "I looked up anything that might have had to do with your eyes turning red since you've been active longer than I have." He tensed, and Val took a step back.

"Did you, now?" The slightly amused and joking tone were all gone now, and the expressions on Phantom's face flickered as quickly as painful memories: apprehension, anger, regret and disgust.

_The last standing city in the world, fallen by one being. Tanks flipped like plastic toys; bullets, shells, explosives all useless. A haunting sound that sent shivers down the spine and quaked the earth and air equally and blood red eyes filled with manic glee and a hunger for more._

_The last standing city can't stand if it's fallen._

_Men in robes singing his praises and begging to be his when they passed, the metallic stench of blood and the feeling of a life fading from a body and the energy flowing into the runes lining the circle through the blood. Lifeless eyes accusing him of what he could only imagine, and oh how his imagination betrayed him as he frantically called the police, bile burning his throat._

"And what, pray tell, did you find?"

Valerie fought down a shiver, unsuccessfully, as the temperature in the room dropped a few degrees and Phantom's eyes steadily grew brighter. Where she found the strength that she heard in her voice, she didn't know. "I found some pictures of you from when you had robbed those banks with the other ghosts, and some info about Freakshow's staff." Valerie didn't know if Phantom knew about other ghostly artifacts that could mess with his mind and frankly if he didn't know, he didn't need to.

"If you want the staff, I broke it." Danny planted his feet firmly on the floor again, glaring openly at the ghost hunter that was talking about something that took away his free will. "Threw it off of a moving train that was going over a bridge. I even checked, and couldn't find the shards."

"No, no I don't want to control you!" This was going nowhere fast, so, she figured, might as well spit it out. "That power you used the other day… that was the kind of power that could do a lot worse than wreck a security system; the construction work is proof of that. You could have done a lot worse to me, and you could have easily destroyed me at any moment, but you haven't. You've helped people out of trouble when it wasn't even ghost related, you help manage all the ghosts in Amity, and you haven't actually done anything malicious since you started of your own accord so," why is it so hard to say? She berated herself for being too prideful to get to the point. "So I've looked at everything and … and I realized you're actually a good guy, and," her tongue felt like lead, "I'm sorry for not seeing that sooner." Awkwardness oozed from the walls at this point, but Valerie kept her head up and eyes on Phantom's. To her horror, green was starting to gain red crescents.

"So let me get this straight? After all the risking of my _life and saving people, your verdict on the case of whether Phantom is good or bad has changed because I destroyed an entire street when I could have done worse?_ " This wasn't something he should be getting angry about, he knew it, but his rage needed a release, and for some reason, everything that just came out of the Huntress' mouth cracked the dam. " _After I saved the town time after time, day in and day out, from every wayward ghost that came in and tried to wreak havoc on Amity Park. After I went through being hunted by ghosts and humans alike, one wanting to skin me alive and put the 'pelt' at the foot of his bed while the others want to dissect me and rip me apart on a molecular level to further their **research** on my kind. After I made it clear that Cujo was not my dog, even though he's only a puppy, euthanized to make room for **your father's security system** that wanted his **damn squeaky toy!**_ "

The room was getting colder and colder as he spoke, and Valerie could feel her armor ready to appear on her body, only a thought away from activation. The comment about her father leading to the euthanization of the guard dogs, though… that and all that Phantom was saying kept her from turning it on. Every teenager needed to vent their angst, and who would have more of it than a dead one? " _After I apologized over and over, told you that I'm only trying to help, after getting nearly impaled by scalpels, burned by an oven, had my mind fucked with by a pop star that's so obsessed with fame that she couldn't hear her own music and a psycho who wanted to use every ghost he came into contact with to steal all that he could!_ " His voice was echoing now from both his spiritual power and the acoustics of the warehouse, and his eyes were slowly going full on red. " _After I fought a fallen king that nearly destroyed me, stopped the one ghost that I've never actually beaten from taking over the past and murdering the people I love, stopped the greatest joke of the Spirit World from unleashing all of the evils that were sealed away from the Earth upon the Human World, stopped a giant plant from turning everyone in this world into fertilizer when no one else was good enough to deal with it, stopped a living storm with m **y messed up emotions, kept a ghost from putting this town into a permanent sleep since he forgot that humans need to do things when they're awake to live - if he had ever been human in the first place**_ **!** " Now her armor appeared, shields going up in case he decided to attack in the fit of rage that he was working himself into.

_"I keep this town safe! This is my home! I lived here; I **died** here, and I **still live here!** I have done nothing but protect the citizens of Amity Park from threats that they can't defend themselves from! And now_ ," he laughed a near hysterical, humorless laugh as frost dusted the floor and windows, even his suit. " _Now, after all that, what convinces you that I didn't **ruin your life** , is a peak into what I can really do? Because I'm **powerful**? Because now you know that I can actually **hurt** people and I don't? Now you **believe me?** **Let me assure you,**_ ** _Valerie Persephone Gray_** ," how had he known that? Danny wondered with the few brain cells not breaking down. " ** _If I were truly as evil as you thought I was, as you probably still think I am, you wouldn't be here apologizing to me for the misunderstanding! I have held back in every fight because I figured you'd eventually listen to me, eventually_** _**listen to reason, someday see that I'm telling the truth, but you're so stubborn it took a show of force to get you to understand that I'm not the threat that I could be**?_ " Vaguely he realized that tears were streaking down his face and freezing into ice crystals before they fell from his face. " _ **Ghosts aren't all evil Valerie!** Why does it take me being powerful to make _ you see that _?_ " Danny curled up into a tight ball in the air and shuddered as the pull from his parents' lab faded away. He was out of steam, out of words, and all he could do was just float there, numb from all that he had said.

Valerie wasn't sure what to say to any of that. Last week, she would have happily shot him down fifty times in the middle of that rant. Now, though, she felt like every word was a punch in the gut and she deserved every blow. Now all the ice and wind that had been turning into a blizzard of emotion from Phantom was fading away, leaving an emptiness that felt heavier than the building itself. Val's armor retracted to wherever it went when she turned it off, but Phantom remained motionless, eyes closed as he floated there. After half a minute of deafening silence, and a lead tongue that kept her from saying anything that came to mind, the dark haired teen crossed the short distance between them that felt like a thousand miles and slowly, careful not to make any sudden moves to startle the hero, pulled Phantom into a gentle hug.

He tensed at first, his skin and his suit dropping ten degrees below freezing at the contact. When she didn't let go from the sudden temperature drop, however, the ghost teen's body returned to normal temperatures - for him - and he returned the chary hug. "... Apology accepted …" It was a breathless whisper that even he almost didn't hear, hardly recognized as his own voice, but she nodded and hugged him tighter for a second before pulling away, and he did the same. "I didn't mean …" he tried to explain, but the words to take it all back were hard to find. "That was more than what was supposed to come out. I'm gonna go now, ok?"

Val nodded and held out her hand. "It was … something, talking to you Phantom."

He nodded in agreement and shook her hand before floating over to the circle, just noticing that there was another symbol. "That it was… what's the feather supposed to be?" He pointed a gloved finger at the symbol in the circle, trying to shake what happened out of his head and let curiosity took over.

Valerie smiled and leaned on a crate, voice quiet and fond. "Danielle."

There was a nod of understanding before Phantom swiped the air with a glowing blue hand and his transformation halos took him back to wherever he had been. The sight had Val wondering about a couple of things, mostly to distract herself a bit even though she knew she deserved every bit of negative emotion the apology and rant had brought upon her. Those rings were the same that appeared when Danielle changed into her Phantom form, and a black kind did the same for Vlad when he turned into Plasmius. If Danielle and Phantom were cousins like they said, then what did those rings mean for Phantom?

* * *

When they got home, Rick and George were feeling far less eager to tell their parents about their day. Rick far less so, but he knew that they had to tell them eventually or else they'd find out from the school; it's not like the staff would let a suspicious supernatural phenomenon like that go overlooked after all. So, George immediately ran to their father's office, since today was his day off and he liked to go through old books and play video games in there. Finding the blond sitting there with a controller in hand and headsets on was a far more relieving sight; he'd be more focused on the game than on what they were saying. "Hey, Dad."

"Hey, boys," Josh's blueberry eyes flickered over to the twins for a moment before refocusing on the screen. "How was school today? You look like you actually feel that black eye of yours and that usually takes either two days or a crappy test grade." Rick winced at the reminder of his prize from the boxing match he won the day before but ignored it. There were more pressing matters to think about.

"'Bad day' is one thing to call it..." George muttered before clearing his throat and squaring his shoulders. "We, uh, got into a bit of an argument with these older kids at lunch."

"They were trying to accuse us of being responsible for something that other people did," Rick clarified when their dad looked away from his game once again. "They were wrong, and we couldn't just let them fling false accusations our way."

"But then, I got mad, and something... something strange happened."

"Define strange." Josh typed rapidly into a chat box that neither of them could see and they knew he was shutting down to focus on them. "Cause we live in a town of ghosts, and you look for cryptids on a regular basis."

"My milk boiled and exploded after I got pissy and apparently quite a few utensils were floating around the cafeteria at the time," George muttered quickly as the laptop was closed. "And according to a few other people who were in the cafeteria my eyes were a different color."

"Some poetic goth dude said 'your eyes are a reflection of the blinding and burning sun' which I thought was both kinda cool and kinda weird." Rick wrapped an arm around George's shoulders and tried for a grin. "On that note, I think Georgy here might have a fan."

"Huh," was all Josh managed to say at first. The boys watched apprehensively as he put away his gaming things and turned to his books. "I was wondering when your telekinesis would come in." When he plucked a book off the shelf titles, Josh turned to the wide eyed and gawking faces of his children, a smirk on his face. "Ya know, it happened to me when I was seven. I was skipping rocks and accidentally hit a frog, and when I reached out, it came to me so that I could try and make it feel better." He leafed through the pages and hummed. "Usually, these powers don't really do something until we do something relevant to a life or death situation."

Rick, ever the logical one, snapped out of his awe induced staring first. "Dad, we live in a town filled with ghosts. Every Wednesday is a life or death situation."

"This is true," finding the page he was looking for, the blond laid down his book and turned it to the twins. "But not every week or day is there one such situation that you have your own personal hands in. It could be something big or small. For me, I threw a rock at a frog and nearly killed it. For you?"

Rick was about to deny that they had anything to do with any recent deaths or even near death experiences, but George beat him to the punch. "There was a cult... they used the summoning video we had posted to summon Phantom, but instead of a drop of their own blood, the idiots killed a cheerleader as a sacrifice."

"No, Georgy, it's not our fault." Rick shook his head and turned to his father with a mask of confidence. "We didn't know that it would happen."

"Yeah, but we should have thought about bad stuff happening…" Rick turned to him, and George let out a sigh. "Ricky, we didn't put enough thought into this."

"Oh, what, we were supposed to somehow see into the future and know that some psychos were going to kill a girl to try and summon a superhero?" This wasn't their fault; George should have known this. "You even said at lunch that it isn't our fault."

"We live in a town with a pair of professional ghost hunters, a good ghost hunter, and government people that want Phantom destroyed." Rick expression went blank, and George wondered if he had gotten through the denial. "Rick, how did we not see something wrong happening from all of this? There're so many people who want Phantom gone…"

"We wanted to help people say thank you to him! We know that he's a hero, the entire town knows! How were we supposed to know that any of this would happen?" The air felt different, in his lungs, on his skin. It was like when they had summoned Phantom in a way, but different. "Besides, no one that hates Phantom even believes in summoning; I bet you. They all call themselves paranormal scientists, but they're too narrow-minded in their beliefs to accept something like this being real."

"If you two are done arguing, I'd like to say something." Josh leaned over his desk, letting the boys remember that he was still there. His expression wasn't the joking grin they were used to seeing, or even the thin line his lips formed when he was upset or thinking really hard about something. Josh was scowling for the first time in the lives of his sons, and that managed to snap them out of their bickering. Taking a deep breath, the man traced the worn leather corners of the book he had laid out for Rick and George. "I knew when I saw that the video was online, that something bad was going to happen. The general populace doesn't need to know all about the powers of other dimensions and how to draw on them just yet since we're still at war with each other."

Rick felt anger flare up in his gut and he pressed his hands against the flat surface of his dad's desk - he didn't slam them down, but it was forceful. "People deserve to know the truth about how they can communicate with other intelligent life forms, don't they? Doesn't everyone deserve to know the truth in general?"

The older Pate took a moment to think the question over before nodding slowly. "In an ideal world, one where everyone is acutely aware of how their actions would affect others, yes. But," he sighed and shook his head.  "Some truths need to remain hidden away from certain people, here in the real world.  Proof of that can be found in your current situation."

"How do we get the truth to the right people without them spreading it to the wrong people, then?"  Rick let out a frustrated huff and sat down in one of the dark leather chairs that adorned his father's office.  "I mean, the internet is there for basically anyone to get to, so how do we make sure that sick people like cultists don't find out about stuff like this?"

"We don't tell anyone the information."  George felt as though he had punched himself in the face with those words, but he knew it was the only logical answer.  "We can't tell people not to tell a cult about the whole summoning ritual, so we just don't tell anyone about the ritual at all."  He sat in the adjacent chair and rested his cheek on his fist.  "That's why we took it off the site in the first place, right?"

"Which is a good step towards trying to prevent it from spreading," Josh nodded and tapped the book he had opened up for them, the old thing lifting itself off the desk to hover in front of them.  "But it won't work.  Too many people have already seen and downloaded it.  I'll handle that, though.  As for you two... study up.  I'll be at a work thing this weekend but when I get back I'm going to be teaching you a thing or two about responsible magic."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rick is still in denial, the Pate's parents are actually a thing this go around for the story, and Danny still needed to word vomit his emotions to someone. but now he can feel how they feel in response to that word vomit! this chapter is like 5000 words, my dudes. I am so happy about that.


	9. Dealing with Nightmares Logically

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> did someone ask for angst and plot? I think one of you did. this edit was posted 12/11/16 at 2 something am

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed it a bit. now it's episode length. enjoy!

When Danny had vanished off to his summoning, Tucker immediately pulled out his PDA to check his radar. At first, they all panicked when he said that Danny wasn't in Amity Park anymore, but seeing that he was simply over in Elmerton, most of their fears subsided. "Valerie and Danny have a truce going on, Sam." The goth glared at her technogeek friend and his frown deepened. "We can't keep treating her like a murderer when she's just acting out of her sense of justice."

"And what's so just about flying around on a hoverboard - provided by _Vlad_ I might add - and shooting at the town's best defense against malicious spirits?" Sam folded her arms and leaned back, not in the mood to hear any more arguments to defend Valerie. It didn't matter at the moment, since Jazz didn't seem to be concerned, and then eldest Fenton child had her boxed in. Jazz might have been a book focused Fenton, but she was still her mother's daughter.

The red head in question was pouring into the book that Sam had provided. "If it's just Valerie then Danny can handle her," she reasoned. "After all, he holds back when he fights pretty much anyone. It's not like she has a way to trap a halfa." She scribbled down notes on one of the various notepads that she kept with her and somehow managed to keep her handwriting legible. It was a skill that not all Fentons had. "What I'm more concerned about right now is this thing about Trials and traits.

"According to this book, there are ten traits that each King of the Netherworld has to prove that he has before he can be coronated as the rightful ruler of the dead world. Each quality represents one of the ten ancient spirits who first anointed the original King - referred to by most spirits only as The Ancients. These traits are Bravery, Passion, Justice, Vigilance, Kindness, Logic, Determination, Caution, Hope, and Empathy."

"Whoever is administering these tests needs to check over Danny's history then." Sam leaned over and looked at the book once again for herself. "Danny has proven his sense of Justice, Bravery and Vigilance plenty of times before. He's always hopeful-"

"The embodiment of each trait might not see him as having passed their individual tests yet." Tucker cut in with a frown. "He has two symbols on him, and we know that each symbol means a trait. We just have to figure out which trait Danny sees the most in you and we should be able to tell which trial he just passed recently."

"Well, that shouldn't take too much effort." Jazz rolled her eyes and continued taking down notes. "He developed empathic abilities just yesterday, and I bet he did his best to see the situation from Rick and George's points of view before speaking at lunch. Otherwise, he'd have made them leave." Tucker snorted, and the redhead raised a brow at him. "Don't think Sam is empathic?"

"No, actually, I think she half sympathizes and then lets her activist instincts go wild." Tucker blocked a swing and winced. "And then things get out of hand, and we have a mess to clean up with Danny's powers and your grandma's money." He covered his head and found it getting hit with a book. "You know it's true."

"Stop hitting him with books, Sam." Jazz looked up again to chastise the goth and hand her the spider backpack. "I don't want to get in trouble for damaging book spines, and we need that brain of his. This is softer, use this."

"Not sure how much we need to rely on a brain that holds no understanding of emotions and how they work," Sam growled and continued her assault with the bag instead, wincing when she felt a hiking book strike her shin. "We deal with ghosts, after all. They run off of emotions, not hard logic."

"My logic bends with my feelings too, Sam," Tucker admitted proudly. "Just because I love and build robots doesn't mean I am one. I'm just better at looking at a situation objectively than you."

"Can you children please take your bickering outside?" Jazz huffed and turned to glare at them both. "I'm trying to take notes here, and I know that you're going to get kicked out of the library with how loud the two of you get so, please don't do it here. Plus," She turned her teal gaze on Tucker, and he shrunk back into his seat. "My research tells that each symbol's relevance to the trait is based on the would-be king's perception. Danny sees Sam as empathic, so Sam's rose is his symbol of empathy. If you disagree, please take it up with the Ancients."

Before Tucker had a chance to retaliate against the tongue lashing that he was getting from Jazz, a flash of light tore the attention of all three teens away from their squabbling. Danny reappeared in the seat next to Tucker and leaned on the slightly taller boy in a slump. "You know, understanding other people's emotions sucks." Tucker patted his best friend's head in response and sighed. "'specially when you rant to someone. You know exactly how guilty it makes them feel, and then you feel bad for makin em feel bad."

"She asked you to rant to her?" Sam raised a brow at this, even as she reached out and handed Danny a roll of crackers. "Also, eat these. Easier on the stomach when you're feeling nauseous. We all know what angst does to you."

The pale halfa accepted the crackers with a grateful smile. He could feel the saltiness that always developed between his meat loving and meat-hating friends when he wasn't there dissipate. "Thanks. And uh, no. She asked to talk with me, and the Deal was that I would stay as long as she didn't attack me. Turns out that Val learned what research was and looked up any recorded instances where I had red eyes." Feeling Tucker tense up next to him, Danny rolled his eyes and popped a saltine into his mouth. "Read up on Freakshow's staff and added that up with all the things I've done that didn't involve red eyes. Took her long enough, but the Red Huntress officially understands that Danny Phantom isn't a bad guy." He grinned in the direction of Sam's pessimistic disbelief. "Maybe she'll be more popular now that she's gonna stop shooting at me and ignoring the ghost I'm fighting."

"Well, she'll stop leading to extra property damage," Tucker shrugged. "Why wouldn't this increase her popularity? Of course, you know..." a sly grin slid into place on Tucker's face like a snake into its home. "This will inspire a whole new level of fanfiction on the websites where your Phans post their stories. Then again, a lot of it is plotless self-insert p-"

"Tucker, I will find a replacement and smack your brain out of place if you finish that sentence." Jazz glared and shut Sam's book, handing it back to the goth. "That's my little brother you're talking about, and I don't need a reminder of how the general populace of our town thinks about him." Tucker gulped audibly and nodded his head, bringing a chuckle out of Danny. "Now, was there anything else from your chat with Valerie that you wanted to tell us about?"

It did occur to Danny that his sister was likely talking asking what he said in his venting rant to the Huntress, but since she didn't specify that he could answer with anything. "She had added a different symbol to my circle." Sitting up properly, Danny cracked his knuckles, delighting in the cringe that blossomed on Jazz's face. "It wasn't exactly a correct part of it, but it was close enough. She said it was to represent Danielle."

Sam and Tucker looked at each other in silent conversation, while Jazz raised her hand a bit in question. "Who is Danielle?" Tucker and Sam then turned to Danny, snorted, and face palmed. "Wow, perfect sync."

"Did I not tell you who Danielle is?" Danny's cheeks gained a light dusting of pink as waves of amusement came in from his friends. He crossed his arms and gave them both a look that was definitely Not a pout. "I thought I told her, ok? Yeesh. I'll tell you on the way home. Mom and Dad might get suspicious if I go straight to Sam or Tuck's for the night. Plus, I wanna get my guitar; the online lessons have yet to be finished." The Fenton siblings slid out of their seats, and the quartet left the library feeling generally better.

* * *

Heaving a heavy sigh, Elle slid down a counter wall and placed her hand on the ground to draw in the energy of the earth slowly. It had taken time and concentration, but she had managed to use life energy to stitch the wound together from the inside out. She didn't want to think about what the effects of using ghostly energy to heal a human would have been. " _That's the best I can do sir; the rest is up to you._ " The words rolled off of her tongue with familiarity only learning. " _I'm confident that you'll get better soon, though._ "

" _Thank you, little girl_ ," the man sat up slowly, holding his head with a shaky hand as the room shifted uncomfortably from the motion. After a couple of seconds, his vision focused on the girl in front of him, wearing worn red shorts and a blue hoodie, even in the heat of Mexico. " _How can I ever repay you?_ "

" _It wasn't that deep sir, really,_ " she was lying, but she didn't want him to feel like he owed her much. " _I just saved you a little trip to the hospital is all. Though, if you could spare a few oranges?_ " It was a grocery store after all, even if it could have been in a better part of town, and the girl was running low on food especially. " _Just a bit for the road?_ "

" _My girl, I've been cut before, and that was more than a little hospital trip that you saved me from. Please, take all the food you need_." He smiled at the way the girl's eyes lit up, framed by her long ebony bangs. " _It's the least I can do."_

" _Thank you very much, sir!_ " She ran back to the front of the store and grabbed her green and orange travel bag, stuffed with her essentials of water, some food, a change of clothes, and a compass, along with a few language books. When she turned back, she saw that the man was wobbling and trying to stand up. " _Oh no, sir, don't get up yet! You've lost a bit of blood, and you need to wait before you move around too much._ " Thinking quickly, the raven haired girl grabbed a cookie from one of the shelves and ran over to him, unwrapping the package and handing it to him. _"Eat this and wait a couple of minutes before standing again ok?"_

" _You know an awful bit about medical treatment for a girl your age. What did you say your name was? Is your father a doctor perhaps_?" He accepted the cookie and watched as the girl walked around the store, only picking up healthier things - oranges, apples, a piece of jerky, a ham sandwich and some orange juice - with the exception of a cookie for herself.

" _My name is Elle, and yes, I suppose he was a doctor._ " She closed up her bag and walked over to the man with a smile, reaching out and shaking his hand. _"Thank you, I hope that you get better soon and that those crooks never come back and bother you._ " With that, Elle walked out the door and headed into the nearest alleyway.

Checking for onlookers and cameras, she sighed and let the white rings of energy wash over her. Red shorts became black and white pants, blue and white sneakers into white boots, the hoodie into a black shirt that was white on the right, a silver DP weaved into the fabric in the center. Her red cap disappeared, and a black glove appeared on her right hand, matched by a white on the left; pitch black hair became pearl white and sparkling blue eyes became glowing ethereal green. Fading from sight, Elle flew up to the rooftop of the building across the street and sat down in a spot where no one would see her from the road unless they actively tried. Becoming visible again, the girl took out an orange and peeled it. "Let's see how long it takes for those imbéciles to come back and try again."

* * *

"So you're telling me that Vlad Masters, a man who saw fit to possess people in order to gain a million dollars, figured out a way to artificially clone people, and was trying to clone himself the perfect son with your DNA, but somehow messed it up and created a girl with an unstable molecular structure?" Jazz had parked a block away from their house to make sure that she got everything from that story that she could away from the ears of their parents. Especially one so ridiculous as that.

"Yup." Danny popped the 'P' as he shook his head at the situation. "The man has the genetic and technological genius to create, albeit imperfect, homunculi based off of a hybrid of two different dimensions, and yet we still have quite a few diseases and things to fight over in the world that technology could solve." It was disappointing really, to know obsession smothered a force for so much good. "At least we got Danielle out of it, and Dad's ecto dejecto was able to stabilize her somehow."

"While I'm glad that something good came of all this, it's really kinda sad. If Vlad just stopped obsessing over you and mom, then he could learn to be happy." Jazz shook her head and shifted out of park. "It's a good thing he hasn't tried anything recently with all that's been going on."

"Yeah, that'd be a disaster." Danny didn't even want to think about how Vlad would twist this whole summoning business to his favor. "For now, let's just get through Mom and Dad ranting about how the ritual didn't work and how they knew it was baloney." As his sister pulled into the driveway, Danny let his thoughts drift around, and they settled on an idea that could very much work in his favor. He needed to tell Vlad about a certain shared future of theirs, and he knew he could word a way around Vlad's desires to get what he wanted. The thought would have to wait until he could talk to Tucker and Sam about it, however, and think up the proper wording for such a Deal.

When Jazz opened the garage door into the kitchen, the siblings were hit with the smell of coffee so strong it might even keep Danny awake and old paper. They walked in to see their parents absorbed it a mountain of books laid out on the table. Most of the books were old enough that the pages were beginning to turn yellow, though a few were newer and Danny was able to see his father's handwriting on the pages of those. Mom was the first one to notice them, looking up from her book and taking a sip from her yellow mug. "Hey kids, how were your days?"

"Mine was good… What are you guys doing?" Jazz was the one to ask, since Danny was just staring at them, bewildered by the sight before him. Sure, their parents had brought experiments up to the kitchen before, even made a few for the kitchen, but they had never brought up research notes or anything like that. This was a weird day, even for Jazz.

"Hm? Oh," Maddie blinked and followed her daughter's gaze to the notes on the table and beamed at the kids. "We're just going over what happened today during our little experiment with that summoning thing and comparing it to some old books we found. We got a rather interesting result that didn't match up exactly with the video that we downloaded from those Pate boys' website the other day."

"Yeah," Jack spoke up as he grabbed his mug and took a big gulp of the brown liquid inside. "It appears as though the ghosts can tell when something's different about the way they're being summoned in one instance to another. Seeing as to how there were multiple reports of the summoning working, we decided to try a similar way of containment, using binding runes that we found in this book."

"It seemed like it would work, we could even hear Phantom talking to someone as we summoned him," a sour look crossed Maddie's face in disappointment. "Unfortunately someone else was apparently summoning him, and he chose the other summons. It is interesting to find out that the ghost can feel the difference between these summons, though, as well as the fact that it works at all. We'll try again tomorrow and see if we can get him to actually appear instead of just going on about the differences to whoever he was talking to."

Danny nodded and walked up the stairs to his room, not wanting to spend much more time listening to his parents plan out how to catch him, and Jazz took the opportunity to ask something she had wondered for a while now. "Mom, Dad?" The couple looked up to show she had their attention and the redhead sighed. "Why did you opened the portal if all you want to do is destroy the ghosts on the other side?" Confusion shone in the eyes of the Drs. Fenton and Jazz let out a heavy sigh. Whatever would they do if the town found out that they were the cause for the ghosts overrunning it? "You seem to hate them quite a bit, and that's putting it mildly, so why would you open up a doorway for them to enter our world? Why not let the dead rest?"

"To prove the existence of, and study, ectoplasmic entities," Maddie responded immediately, as though it was part of a speech prepared for a press conference. "We hunt them because they're dangerous beings that pose a threat to our world."

"They never posed such a threat to the earth until this portal was created," Jazz countered, her frown deepening as she saw that her parents weren't likely to budge on this subject anytime soon. "Before the Fenton Portal they didn't have a way of getting into this dimension."

"Not true," Jack said with even more confidence than normal, which was saying something. "After college and the partial failure with the protoportal," Jazz remembered her father once saying that anything that didn't completely fail was technically only a partial failure, "we went across the country and looked for ghosts. Thanks to the ectoplasm we were able to gather from the protoportal before the opening closed itself, we were able to track ectoplasmic signatures. We found a few minor hot spots of it in various places all over the U.S. and have even seen a few ghosts open portals back to the Ghost Zone on their own." Jazz grimaced, and Jack grinned.

"You see, Jazz," Maddie continued for her husband while he went back to reading, his attention spent and in need of a shift. "This is why we needed the portal. So that we can develop ways of defending ourselves against these creeps when they slip into our world. Otherwise, they could have attacked without opposition. Imagine what would have happened with the invasion of Pariah Dark if we didn't have the Ghost Shield?"

Jazz let out a huff of frustration. As much as she hated to admit it, her parents had a point with that. She knew that there were ghosts out there with the ability to generate their own portals - more than likely the Box Ghost was one of them. She just wished that her parents hadn't known that. After a brief internal debate, she nodded and turned to the stairs. "Ok, I understand where you're coming from there." This conversation was hardly over, but she had to put it on hold. If Jazz argued too passionately with her parents like Sam would, she would risk getting grounded and thus unable to help her brother. "Make sure to get some sleep, ok?"

"Sleep is for the weak, Jazzerincess!" Jack replied with a grin before getting elbowed in the side by his wife. He coughed and looked up at Jazz entirely this time. "I mean uh, we will. You get some too. Night."

"Night honey!" Maddie shook her head in slight exasperation. Really, her husband was so immature at times. Though that was part of the reason she loved him, he did need to reign it in a bit.

* * *

While Jazz spoke with their parents, Danny started up the computer that Tucker had picked out, Sam had bought, and he had upgraded personally. Thanks to the blueprints for the Fenton Portal's genetic lock, Danny was able to set it up so that his computer only responded when a select few's fingerprints graced the keyboard. He made sure that the camera was on, and contacted Sam and Tuck through the app that the technogeek had been all too happy to create for them personally. Upon clicking on their call icons, Danny laughed. Tucker had already turned his icon into a screwdriver, and Sam a thorned rose. When the faces of his best friends appeared on screen, the half-ghost waved with a devious smile. "Hey guys, I got an idea."

"Danny, those are the four most terrifying words in the English language." Tucker paused and reconsidered his statement. "In any language." The geek leaned forward with a matching grin, the goth doing the same.

"What is it?" Sam loved it when Danny came up with pranks, and that was his pranking face. It would do him some good to take a break from everything and look at the brighter side of life.

"I was telling Jazz about Danielle, and it hit me; if this summoning bullshit works on me, it can work on Vlad too." Well, that dashed Sam's faint hope that Danny had thought about anything other than ghost fighting, but at least it was something. "I can't beat Vlad in a fair, one on one fight." Both of his friends frowned, doubt written all over their faces. Before they could bring up his previous victories he continued. "With my training with Pandora and Frostbite and mom, I know a pulled punch when I feel it. All the times that Vlad's fought me, I've been lucky that he wants me as his son; the guy was pulling his punches a lot more than Frostbite was."

"That's.. actually true," Tucker admitted, thinking about all the fights that Danny had told them about including Vlad. "You've only really won by tricking him and foiling his plan or weakening him. So, what's the plan this time?" The geek was ready to go with whatever plan Danny had in mind, even if it would probably need a few tweaks to make it work.

"Hold on," Danny turned away from the computer and waved at Jazz as she entered. "C'mon I got an idea."

"I'm terrified; that usually leads to me being covered in ectogoop or body paint." Jazz chuckled when Danny rolled his eyes, sitting down on his bed and leaning forward. "What's up?"

A fleeting frown danced over Danny's face before returning to his usual grin. There was some anxiety coming off of Jazz; something had happened between her and their parents. He'd have to ask about that at some point, but right now Danny needed to stay focused on the thing at hand for now. "I was thinking that I could make a deal with Vlad. I have information that would be useful to both me and him, and if I can get him to agree to a deal, I think I can settle things with him."

"Your latest fight must have rattled your brains around a bit," Sam frowned at him, and Danny held back a sigh. "A deal with _Vlad_? Are you crazy, Danny? He's a manipulative sleaze ball that nearly _killed_ you ten ti-"

" _Nearly_ ," He interjected quietly, stopping her tirade at the start. "But he hasn't killed me. He's held back all this time. Sam, he kicked my ass when he won the election, and he won it by a landslide. That means he was overshadowing more than a thousand people - _controlling the minds_ of more than a thousand individual people at once - while still beating me. If he really wanted to kill me, he could have done it already."

"And the only reason he hasn't is because he wants you as his son!" Sam threw up her arms in frustration and leaned forward as though getting closer to the camera would get her point across. "Danny, he wants you to _kill_ your _dad_ personally! How does that not tell you that this is a man that you don't want to make any kind of deal with, let along a mystically binding contract?"

"He wants a family, Sam." Danny let out a sigh and leaned back in his chair. "He wants someone to love who will love him back, and the obsessive nature that both he and I possess as halfas has lead him to think that killing dad will make mom love him. If I can get him to agree to the deal I'm thinking off, he can be part of a family, and I get the safety of my family almost guaranteed." A thoughtful frown marred his face. "After all, if he's incorporated into the family and realizes that Dad isn't his enemy but his closest - probably _only_ \- friend, then he'll defend this family to the end."

Before Sam could think of a way to turn that on its head and tell Danny that it was a bad idea, Jazz placed a hand on his shoulder. "What deal do you have in mind?" Jazz could tell that Danny had already set his mind on this, and telling him not to do it would only lead to a solo attempt that could end up with him killed, brainwashed or kidnapped. The only thing to do was to be there for him and make sure that his plan didn't go up in smoke because of poor wording.

A smile crept onto Danny's face as a wave of understanding flowed from his sister and he let out a breath. "If Vlad promises to listen to what I have to say until the end of my sentence and takes it into consideration, I'll let him train me in a single power of my choosing. That way, he's not getting anything to hold against me, but he is getting something that he wants to do, and I get to learn from the only halfa I know that's more experienced than me."

Everyone was quiet for a moment, befoe Tucker began squinting at the screen. When Sam asked what he was doing, his response had the Goth snorting in amusement. "I want to make sure that this is our Danny, not Sydney Poindexter controlling him." Danny rolled his eyes and Jazz raised a brow, having not been told that story. "...Nope, his eyes are still blue, not gray. I'm just shocked that you came up with such a reasonable plan."

"Hey!" Danny gave an indignant squawk. "I can make plans that make sense sometimes!"

"Make sense to whom?" Sam raised a brow. "Danny, you're a Fenton. Your ideas only make sense to Fentons."

"I slightly resent that comment," Jazz huffed, a grin slipping onto her face. "But you do have a bit of a point."

"Who here is on my - tingly..." Danny reached up and scratched at his neck. After a moment, Jazz pushed his hand back to see what was itching and gasped. On the right side of Danny's neck was the image of a screwdriver drawn in straight, sharp lines. It was faded only enough that one could mistake it as a birthmark - if it weren't so detailed. "What is it?"

"You appear to have passed another trial. I assume the test of Logic since you were thinking up a logical way of dealing with one of your most complicated enemies." Jazz smiled at her brother before kissing his forehead.

"Jazz," he groaned, pushing her back a bit with a grin. "I guess that makes sense. But with these symbols coming so soon after each other, the Ancients must be in a hurry to get a new king, huh?" The thought that the ghosts that decided who the new ruler of the entire ectoplasmic dimension were in a hurry for that new leader to be chosen was a sobering one. What could possibly have them rushing?

"Especially considering that you'd be a baby to them." Danny flashed an emerald glare at Tucker and the geek shrugged. He was used to that by now, and it hardly made him flinch. "Think about it; a ghost is practically immortal, right? So to them, a human adolescent is barely a baby. Plus, they wouldn't count your previous fifteen years of life experience, but your one and a half year of ghost experience. So technically, you're only a year older than Danielle in Ghost terms."

"You _do_ remember that I can get into the internet, trace this signal, and pop out of your computer to hit you, right?" Danny grinned when he saw Tuck hesitate from the reminder.

"You're too sweet and loving to do that." Sam and Jazz burst into laughter and Danny pouted.

"I can be sweet!"

* * *

It was night time when the fools came back to the shop with weapons in hand, and all in black. " _How cliche can ya get?_ " Elle shook her head and flew down invisibly, touching down in front of the thugs. There were five of them this time, and the extra three were bigger than the two from that afternoon. Letting her invisibility drop, the girl floated up until she was eye level with the tallest of them, grinning at the way they flinched at her appearance. " _Hello and thank you for coming to Papa Don's, sadly we're closed for the night. We do, however, offer twenty-four hour butt whoop for all interested customers._ "

Apparently, their initial shock was no more than that, as evidenced by a crowbar that nearly knocked Elle out of the air had she not turned intangible at the last second. Her then very solid foot connected with the man's chest and knocked the air out of his lungs before she dropped down and swept his feet out from under him. A fist clipped her in the head and she used the momentum from the punch to roll forward in a ball, knocking the other small one down before she popped up and fired ghost rays at all the weapons she saw. The smaller two shouted in response but a quick kick to the head knocked them out. " _Honestly, you'd think that people would consider what they're buying before they subscribe._ " So caught up in her tsking, Elle didn't notice the man behind her until she was being lifted up by large beefy arms. " _Hey, hands off the merchandise!_ " With a sharp jerk of her head, Elle struck the man in his collarbone and he let go, only to be punched in the face and land on the ground unconscious. " _If I have to fix this outfit one more time, I swear I'm gonna scream._ "

The last two growled at her and circled around, looking for an opening. " _The hell is she? Some kinda monster?"_ He started throwing punches that Elle dodged just for the fun of it. " _Hold still you brat!"_

 _"Even if I did, you still wouldn't hit me."_ She grabbed the guy's wrist and twisted it, grasping his shoulder and flipping him over hers, tossing him at his friend. " _And FYI, it's kind of embarrassing if you can't even tell a ghost when you see one. I mean the floating at the very least should have tipped you off."_ The last one got up, ready to go and tell their boss no doubt, but was met with a swift roundhouse to the temple that had him seeing stars.

Dusting her gloves off, Elle snorted and looked for something to bind them up with, deciding on the gang's own chains. "That was anticlimactic." Grabbing the chain that one almost swung at her, and a crowbar that had been dropped, the ghost girl proceeded to tie them all up with their backs to each other and weld the chains to the crowbar so that they'd need the police to get them out. Pulling out one of their phones she dialed the police and gave an anonymous tip.

* * *

After around an hour or two of talking, Tucker yawned, and Sam rolled her eyes. "It's only eleven, you baby. That reminds me, though, Danny are you ok to go to sleep alone?" That may have sounded weird for any other teenager to say to another teen, but when it came to Danny, they didn't care about weird, only his health. The halfa raised a brow at the goth, and she sighed. "You went through a lot in the past couple of days, Danny, I just thought you might wanna come and sleep over."

"She has a point dude," Tucker added before Danny could get a word in. "If not her house then you can come sleep over here. My parents actually like you." The trio snickered at that, Jazz having gone back to her room for rest an hour ago.

Danny shook his head and pushed back his chair. Stretching his back a bit, the junior ghost hunter grinned at his best buds. "Nah, I should be good. After all, I can't let it haunt me forever, right?" He half believed what he was saying, so it wasn't entirely a lie. Danny wasn't okay, he knew that for sure. But he also knows that he can't just sleep over at Tucker and Sam's places for the rest of his life. Not only would that be unfair to them, but he's also not gonna let this experience drag him down like that. It would be letting those cultists win.

"If you're sure..." Sam hesitated, feeling that there was no way in hell Danny could be so ok after only a day. Granted, it had been the best movie night in a while with all the cuddling and having him still for more than ten minutes at a time, but it was still only one night. No one bounced back that quickly.

Danny waved her off and let out a yawn of his own. "Yes, shoo, I'm fine. Go do whatever it is eco goths do when regular people are sleeping." That earned him some laughs from both friends, and they all signed off.

After a quick shower, Danny pulled on his pajama pants and crawled into bed. His nightmares couldn't possibly be that bad.

How wrong he was.

_A city in ruins, spectral skeleton soldiers in the streets, the bodies of civilians littering the sidewalks. Everywhere he turned there was blood that bathed his tongue, smoke that burned his nose and throat and chanting and praising that echoed in his head. All of it was for him, all of this was his fault. His knight fought against his friends, his family, his city, his world as it all came crumbling down around him and it was wrong wrong wrong. He didn't want this, he didn't want any of this death and destruction and mayhem, didn't want any of this! A girl so like him yet so young, so new to the world that she was forced upon, fell from the sky, shot down by one who once called her friend. The men in robes ran to her, ran to protect their precious lord's beloved sister, but they were traitors to their own kind and the white-clad agents cut them all down as though they were the ghosts they worshipped even though he told them not to, begged them not to hurt anyone, that he wanted peace not war, but they didn't listen, they never listened, and it was all burning._

_Missiles and grenades and beams of light flew in every direction in the chaos so thick he almost couldn't tell who was who. He stuck by his friends, stayed above them, had to protect his brother, protect his sisters, protect his friends, protect his family. Twin gazes of horror stared up at him as he fought against both sides that fought for him and tried not to hurt those who fought for survival against the wave of vengeful spirits that did not listen, he did not want this, he told them not to, but they did not listen, but it was for him, they wanted to keep him safe from the humans that hunted him and their kind, hunted and slain and caught and tortured all in the name of **science** , and it was wrong, this was all wrong wrong wrong! There were sigils carved deep into concrete and brick and stone and wood, everywhere that it could be, all with his symbol, his initials, his name, and there was blood spilt, both red and green, bitter and sweet, so thick, so much, so strong he couldn't taste anything but the blood of both of his peoples, as beams of red and rays of green fired out against a sea of white and an ocean of green. This was wrong, all of it was wrong, there was blood on the runes, blood in the sewers and the streets and the buildings and there were sigils everywhere soaking up the blood and sending all of the power to him, and he didn't want it, he didn't want the power, didn't want this at all!_

_" **Oh didn't you Danny boy?** " No, no no no, he couldn't be here, the timekeeper was holding him prisoner, he was gone, he was locked up and banished from this world he was gone he couldn't **be** there! " **But of course I'm here, Danny. Because you're still here, and as long as you still exist, I will always be inevitable**." But he couldn't be real, could he? He had promised never to go down that road again, never stray from the light, never do anything _ wro _\- " **Wherever there is Light, there is Darkness. I am the thing that keeps you up at night. The evil that haunts the dark corners of your mind. I shall always exist Danny, and you've never been closer to being me**." It wasn't true, it couldn't be true because he was good, he was always good, he worked so so so hard to be good all the time. Never slip up, never do bad, never hurt anyone. " **Ah, but you have slipped Danny, time and time again. Shall we count the ways?"**_

_" **You start up a prank war with no regards to the consequences for your enemy, even going as far as to loose the men whom you fear the most on him without a second thought, for you know that if they ever caught something like you, like him, they'd cut you open and rip you apart, without so much as a second thought.** " The flashes of red grew dimmer and dimmer, overwhelmed by a sea of white and a roar of pain rang out through the night. " **You turn from him the only living being with a brain that ever genuinely cared for him, who he could have easily saved as he promised even with the other, leaving him to once again be no more than a lonely and bitter old man."** The roar went silent, and the red light went out._

_**"And let us not forget that single girl that you let roam free, hardly a year old, on her own in the streets with no sure way of food or shelter, a freak thrust upon the world, shown that the one she loved the most cared not for her, and sent out into the big bad human world to fend for herself."** His followers fell, and the skeletons were turned to dust and red and black descended upon his precious sister who pleaded and cried and begged for her friend to help her, to spare her, only for the green light in her eyes to die by harsh violet._

_" **Oh and that friend that she made, let's not forget her. Oh, Valerie, the huntress that scorned you for leaving her in the lowest social circles of high school, forced into working for a living with her father, and having dedicated herself to fighting against dangerous supernatural forces, all because she wanted to protect you, from you. If only she had known the truth, she wouldn't have had to obsess over getting revenge, wouldn't have put herself in danger over and over again to protect Amity Park, but most especially you from you and your kind."** Black and red rode her board into the ocean of violent, unnatural green and was swept up, the flashes of purple and red dying out faster than the red did in the white. " **Had you not been so protective of your precious secret she wouldn't be in danger all the time.** "_

_He didn't want this, it had to stop, they had to stop, he didn't want this, this wasn't what he wanted, not at all. " **Isn't it, though? Didn't you just love the rush of power and the taste of fresh warm blood? Relished in the strength that came from the blood of the living rushing into you as a sacrifice from your real biggest fans? Strength and power enough that you could take on anything, deal with anyone that got in your way or threatened what was yours?"** The voice that was echoing in his head and shaking his mind was now right in his ear, practically purring with its dark sins. " **No plant,"** a blade of green light broken and the wielder impaled, " **No machine,"** a gun melted away and a flash of light that left nothing but a cracked pair of glasses, " **No foolish book writer,"** a suit torn open and the wearer gutted with razor talons as her dying screams echoed into the night, joining countless others, " **No vampire fool or revenge obsessed girl, no spirit, no human, no being strong enough to take what's yours, and everything becomes yours.** " No no no, this was wrong wrong wrong, it was wrong, and he didn't want it, and all that he loved and all that he fought for, all that he protected, all that he bled for was crashing, breaking, tearing, crumpling, burning, burning, burning, everyth **ing was burninG MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP!**_

* * *

Jazz was there, and he was crying, sobbing beyond control as he finally reverted back to human form and lost consciousness again. Their parents walked in at the very last moment, and nearly saw him transform. Jazz picked him up, and he would sleep in her room and bed tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, yeah. I am trying to plot. Is it working? does this seem like a plot this time around?


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angst, a friend returns, someone's up to something, and angst

Danny reappeared in the library next to his sister, who dropped her book and turned to him when the rings appeared.  When she saw the tear tracks, she internalized her freak out and pulled her baby brother into a tight hug as the transformation rings engulfed him.  “Want to tell us what happened little brother?”  He nodded slowly and took a few breaths.  Jazz waited. Patience helping more than knowledge with this kind of situation.

Eventually, he cleared his throat to speak.  “Valerie was the other one that summoned me, and not for anything bad.”  Sam looked skeptical but kept her thoughts to herself as he continued.  “She made a deal to talk with me and I accepted.  Turns out more than just us look at a ghost’s eyes when it’s all over the news, and other people have read Freakshow’s book.”  That was another something that they’d have to look at now since they didn’t go into much detail during their trip across the country.  “She finally realized that I’m not a bad guy.  I… may,” he shifted in his sister’s hold and rubbed the back of his neck, “or may not have ranted at her a bit anyway, and it turns out that she used a feather in the circle to summon me.”

“A feather?”  Sam raised a brow at that and Tucker snorted.  “Pretty sure you’re not the bird type.  Unless there’s something you wanted to tell us about your love of animals?”  Even as she joked, Sam placed a hand on Danny’s leg in silent support.

Somehow the ghost-boy managed to laugh at that and shook his head.  “She said it represented Danielle.”  His friends wore identical expressions of shock at his words and Danny laughed a bit more, even as confusion danced across his sister’s face.  “We can add that to the one we have right?  A feather will fit in somewhere.”

“Yeah, the circle just needs to be adjusted a bit…” Sam trailed off as her thoughts drifted to the female clone.  Truly, the only good thing to come of Vlad’s meddling in Danny’s life.  The three of them all had to wonder, where was she now?

“Um, guys?”  Jazz held up her hand to grab their attentions in case her voice hadn’t and the younger teens blinked up at her.  “Who is Danielle and why would she make sense to be part of the circle?”

“That’s right!”  Tucker nearly facepalmed in realization.  “We never told you about her did we?  Well, you see-”  He was cut off by a beeping that came from his and Sam’s phones.  Checking a text from his father he sighed and stood.  “I gotta go, guys, my dad’s having his boss over for dinner tonight and he wants me there and dressed my best.”

“My parents want me home to discuss some business thing too.  I’ll work on the circle later, but for now I gotta go ok?”  The friends all got up and had a group hug.  “See you guys tomorrow.”

“Later guys,” Danny waved as they left and turned to his still curious sister.  “Ok, so you remember that time I kinda blew up a minigolf course?”

* * *

 

Sighing heavily a young girl sat back on the floor and rested a bit before standing to examine her work with critical icy blue eyes.  The gash in the man’s side had closed up rather nicely and with a bit of concentration she could feel that he was better on the inside as well.  “ _That’s the best I can do sir, the rest is up to you._ ”  The words rolled off of her tongue with familiarity only learning.  “ _I’m confident that you’ll get better soon, though._ ”

“ _Thank you, little girl_ ,” the man sat up slowly, holding his head with a shaky hand as the room shifted uncomfortably from the motion.  After a couple of seconds, his vision focused on the girl in front of him, wearing worn red shorts and a blue hoodie, even in the heat of Mexico.  “ _How can I ever repay you?_ ”

“ _It wasn’t that deep sir, really_ ,” she was lying, but she didn’t want him to feel like he owed her much.  “ _I just saved you a little trip to the hospital is all.  Though, if you could spare a few oranges?_ ”  It was a grocery store after all, even if it could have been in a better part of town, and the girl was running low on food especially.  “ _Just a bit for the road?_ ”

“ _My girl, I’ve been cut before and that was more than a mere hospital trip that you saved me from.  Please, take all the food you need._ ”  He smiled at the way the girl’s eyes lit up, framed by her long ebony bangs.  “ _It’s the least I can do_.”

“ _Thank you very much, sir!_ ”  She ran back to the front of the store and grabbed her green and orange travel bag, stuffed with her essentials of water, some food, a change of clothes, and a compass, along with a few language books.  When she turned back she saw that the man was wobbling and trying to stand up.  “ _Oh no, sir, don’t get up yet!  You’ve lost a bit of blood and you need to wait before you move around too much._ ”  Thinking quickly, the raven haired girl grabbed a cookie from one of the shelves and ran over to him, unwrapping the package and handing it to him.  “ _Eat this and wait a couple of minutes before standing again ok?_ ”

“ _You know an awful bit about medical treatment for a girl your age.  What did you say your name was?  Is your father a doctor perhaps?_ ”  He accepted the cookie and watched as the girl walked around the store, only picking up healthier things - oranges, apples, a piece of jerky, a ham sandwich and some orange juice - with the exception of a cookie for herself.

“ _My name is Elle, and yes, I suppose he was a doctor._ ”  She closed up her bag and walked over to the man with a smile, reaching out and shaking his hand.  “ _Thank you, I hope that you get better soon and that those crooks never come back and bother you._ ”  With that, Elle walked out the door and headed into the nearest alleyway.  

Checking for onlookers and cameras, she sighed and let the white rings of energy wash over her.  Red shorts became black and white pants, blue and white sneakers into white boots, the hoodie into a black shirt that was white on the right, a silver DP woven into the fabric in the center.  Her red cap disappeared and a black glove appeared on her right hand, matched by a white on the left; pitch black hair became pearl white and sparkling blue eyes became glowing ethereal green.  Fading from sight, Elle flew up to the rooftop of the building across the street and sat down in a spot where no one would see her from the street unless they actively tried.  Becoming visible again, the girl took out an orange and peeled it.  “Let’s see how long it takes for those imbéciles to come back and try again.”

* * *

 

“So you’re telling me that Vlad Masters, a man who saw fit to possess people in order to gain a million dollars, figured out a way to artificially clone people, and was trying to clone himself the perfect son with your DNA, but somehow messed it up and created a girl with an unstable molecular structure?”  Jazz had parked a block away from their house to make sure that she got everything from that story that she could away from the ears of their parents.  Especially one so ridiculous as that.

“Yup.”  Danny popped the ‘P’ as he shook his head at the situation.  “The man has the genetic and technological genius to create, albeit imperfect, clones of a hybrid of two different dimensions, and yet we still have quite a few diseases and things to fight over in the world that could be solved through technology.”  It was disappointing really, to know obsession smothered a force for so much good.  “At least we got Danielle out of it, and Dad’s ecto dejecto was able to stabilize her somehow.”

“While I’m glad that something good came of all this, it’s really kinda sad.  If he just stopped obsessing over you and mom then he could learn to be happy.”  Jazz shook her head and shifted out of park.  “It’s a good thing he hasn’t tried anything recently with all that’s been going on.”

“Yeah, that’d be a disaster.”  Danny didn’t even want to think about how Vlad would twist this whole summoning business to his favor.  “For now, let’s just get through Mom and Dad ranting about how the ritual didn’t work and how they knew it was baloney.”  As his sister pulled into the driveway, Danny let his thoughts drift around, and they settled on an idea that could very much work in his favor.  Before he could voice it, however, he wanted to be in his room with his sister and friends.

Walking into the kitchen through the garage entrance, Danny and Jazz were mildly surprised to see their parents pouring over notes with coffee cups in hand.  Their mother noticed them first, Jack being too absorbed into his reading and the notes he was scribbling down in a book of his that the siblings had never seen before.  “Hey guys, how were your days?”  She set down her own book and took a sip of coffee.

“Mine was good… What are you guys doing?”  Jazz was the one to ask, since Danny was just staring at them, bewildered by the sight before him.  Sure, their parents had brought experiments up to the kitchen before, even made a few for the kitchen, but they had never brought up research notes or anything like that.  This was a weird day, even for Jazz.

“Hm?  Oh,” Maddie blinked and followed her daughter’s gaze to the notes on the table and beamed at the kids.  “We’re just going over what happened today during our little experiment with that summoning thing and comparing it to some old books we found.  We got a rather interesting result that didn’t match up exactly with the video that we downloaded from those Pate boys’ website the other day.”

“Yeah,” Jack spoke up as he grabbed his mug and took a big gulp of the brown liquid inside.  “It appears as though the ghosts can tell when something’s different about the way they’re being summoned in one instance to another.  Seeing as to how there were multiple reports of the summoning working, we decided to try a similar way of containment, using binding runes that we found in this book.”

“It seemed like it would work, we could even hear Phantom talking to someone as we summoned him,” a sour look crossed Maddie’s face in disappointment.  “Unfortunately someone else was apparently summoning him and he chose the other summons.  It is interesting to find out that the ghost can feel the difference between these summons, though, as well as the fact that it works at all.  We’ll try again tomorrow and see if we can get him to actually appear instead of just going on about the differences to whoever he was talking to.”

Danny nodded and walked up the stairs to his room, not wanting to spend much more time listening to his parents plan out how to catch him, and Jazz took the opportunity to ask something she had wondered for a while now.  “Mom, Dad?”  The couple looked up to show she had their attention and the redhead sighed.  “Why did you opened the portal if all you want to do is destroy the ghosts on the other side?”  They stilled at the question, both of them uncomfortable with being put on the spot about that obviously, and it made Jazz wonder what they would do if it got out that they were the main reason ghosts infested the town.  “You seem to hate them quite a bit, and that’s putting it mildly, so why would you open up a doorway for them to enter our world?  Why not let the dead rest?”

Jack looked to Maddie, and she to him.  Neither could remember the answer to that question, and that realization left a bad taste in their mouths.  Millions of possible responses ran through their minds, but none of them were the real reason, were they?  Seeing that she wasn’t going to get any answers, Jazz stood and headed for the stairs.  “I hope that you figure it out eventually because I really can’t.”  With that, she went upstairs and into her brother’s room.

“Alright Danny, you had your idea face on right before I opened the door to the kitchen.”  Jazz set down her purse and sat on his bed as the sophomore occupied his desk chair, Tucker and Sam coming into view on the video chat.

“Alright, so a summoning circle works on me right?  What about other halfas?”

* * *

 

It was night time when the fools came back to the shop with weapons in hand, and all in black.  “How cliche can ya get?”  Elle shook her head and flew down invisibly, touching down in front of the thugs.  There were five of them this time, and the extra three were bigger than the two from that afternoon.  Letting her invisibility drop, the girl floated up until she was eye level with the tallest of them, grinning at the way they flinched at her appearance.  “ _Hello and thank you for coming to Papa Don’s, sadly we’re closed for the night.  We do, however, offer twenty-four-hour butt whoop for all interested customers._ ”

Apparently their initial shock was no more than that, as evidenced by a crowbar that nearly knocked Elle out of the air had she not turned intangible at the last second.  Her then very solid foot connected with the man’s chest and knocked the air out of his lungs before she dropped down and swept his feet out from under him.  A fist clipped her in the head and she used the momentum from the punch to roll forward in a ball, knocking the other small one down before she popped up and fired ghost rays at all the weapons she saw.  The smaller two shouted in response, but a quick kick to the head knocked them out.  “ _Honestly, you’d think that people would consider what they’re buying before they subscribe._ ”  So caught up in her tsking, Elle didn’t notice the man behind her until she was being lifted up by large beefy arms.  “ _Hey, hands off the merchandise!_ ”  With a sharp jerk of her head, Elle struck the man in his collarbone and he let go, only to be punched in the face and land on the ground unconscious.  “ _If I have to fix this outfit one more time, I swear I’m gonna scream._ ”

The last two growled at her and circled around, looking for an opening.  “ _The hell is she?  Some kinda monster?_ ”  He started throwing punches that Elle dodged just for the fun of it.  “ _Hold still you brat!_ ”

“ _Even if I did, you still wouldn’t hit me._ ”  She grabbed the guy’s wrist and twisted it, grasping his shoulder and flipping him over hers, tossing him at his friend.  “ _And FYI, it’s kind of embarrassing if you can’t even tell a ghost when you see one.  I mean the floating at the very least should have tipped you off._ ”  The last one got up, ready to go and tell their boss no doubt, but was met with a swift roundhouse to the temple that had him seeing stars.

Dusting her gloves off, Elle snorted and looked for something to bind them up with, deciding on the gang’s own chains.  “That was anticlimactic.”  Grabbing the chain that one almost swung at her, and a crowbar that had been dropped, the ghost girl proceeded to tie them all up with their backs to each other and weld the chains to the crowbar so that they’d need the police to get them out.  Pulling out one of their phones, she dialed the police and gave an anonymous tip.

* * *

 

After Sam and Tucker went offline and Jazz went back into her room, Danny thought to risk a night on his own again.  Sure it was only a day, but he bounced back pretty quick right?   _It’s not like I’m gonna have nightmares about it for the rest of my life or anything right?_  So, he slipped into his pajamas, turned off the lights, and let himself drift to sleep, expecting at the very least a blissful dreamless oblivion.  How wrong he was.

_A city in ruins, spectral skeleton soldiers in the streets, the bodies of civilians littering the sidewalks.  Everywhere he turned there was blood that bathed his tongue, smoke that burned his nose and throat and chanting and praising that echoed in his head.  All of it was for him, all of this was his fault.  His knight fought against his friends, his family, his city, his world as it all came crumbling down around him and it was wrong wrong wrong.  He didn’t want this, he didn’t want any of this death and destruction and mayhem, didn’t want any of this!  A girl so like him yet so young, so new to the world that she was forced upon, fell from the sky, shot down by one who once called her friend.  The men in robes ran to her, ran to protect their precious lord’s precious sister, but they were traitors to their own kind and the white-clad agents cut them all down as though they were the ghosts they worshipped even though he told them not to, begged them not to hurt anyone, that he wanted peace not war, but they didn’t listen, they never listened and it was all burning._

_Missiles and grenades and beams of light flew in every direction in the chaos so thick he almost couldn’t tell who was who.  He stuck by his friends, stayed above them, had to protect his brother, protect his sisters, protect his friends, protect his family.  Twin gazes of horror stared up at him as he fought against both sides that fought for him and tried not to hurt those who fought for survival against the wave of vengeful spirits that did not listen, he did not want this, he told them not to, but they did not listen, but it was for him, they wanted to keep him safe from the humans that hunted him and their kind, hunted and slain and caught and tortured all in the name of **science** , and it was wrong, this was all wrong wrong wrong!  There were sigils carved deep into concrete and brick and stone and wood, everywhere that it could be, all with his symbol, his initials, his name, and there was blood spilt, both red and green, bitter and sweet, so thick, so much, so strong he couldn’t taste anything but the blood of both of his peoples, as beams of red and rays of green fired out against a sea of white and an ocean of green.  This was wrong, all of it was wrong, there was blood on the runes, blood in the sewers and the streets and the buildings and there were sigils everywhere soaking up the blood and sending all of the power to him and he didn’t want it, he didn’t want the power, didn’t want this at all!_

_“ **Oh didn’t you Danny boy?** ”  No, no no no, he couldn’t be here, the timekeeper was holding him, prisoner, he was gone, he was locked up and banished from this world he was gone he couldn’t **be** there!  “ **But of** course **, I’m here, Danny.  Because you’re still here, and as long as you still exist, I will always be inevitable.** ”  But he couldn’t be real, could he?  He had promised never to go down that road again, never stray from the light, never do anything wro- “ **Wherever there is Light, there is Darkness.  I am the thing that keeps you up at night.  The evil that haunts the dark corners of your mind.  I shall always exist Danny, and you’ve never been closer to being me**.” It wasn’t true, it couldn’t be true because he was good, he was always good, he worked so so so hard to be good all the time.  Never slip up, never do bad, never hurt anyone.  “ **Ah, but you have slipped Danny, time and time again.  Shall we count the ways?** ”_

_“ **You start up a prank war with no regards of the consequences for your enemy, even going as far as to loose the men whom you fear the most on him without a second thought, for you know that if they ever caught something like you, like him, they’d cut you open and rip you apart, without so much as a second thought.** ”  The flashes of red grew dimmer and dimmer, overwhelmed by a sea of white and a roar of pain rang out through the night.  “ **You turn from him the only living being with a brain that ever genuinely cared for him, who he could have easily saved as he promised even with the other, leaving him to once again be no more than a lonely and bitter old man.** ”  The roar went silent, and the red light went out.  _

_“ **And let us not forget that single girl that you let roam free, hardly a year old, on her own in the streets with no sure way of food or shelter, a freak thrust upon the world, shown that the one she loved the most cared not for her, and sent out into the big bad human world to fend for herself.** ”  His followers fell and the skeletons were turned to dust and red and black descended upon his precious sister who pleaded and cried and begged for her friend to help her, to spare her, only for the green light in her eyes to die by harsh violet.  _

_“ **Oh and that friend that she made, let’s not forget her.  Oh** **Valerie, the huntress that scorned you for leaving her in the lowest social circles of highschool, forced into working for a living with her father, and having dedicated herself to fighting against dangerous supernatural forces, all because she wanted to protect you, from you.  If only she had known the truth, she wouldn’t have had to obsess over getting revenge, wouldn’t have put herself in danger over and over again to protect Amity Park, but most especially**_ **you** _**from** _ **you** _**and** _ **your** _**kind.** ”  Black and red rode her board into the ocean of violent, unnatural green and was swept up, the flashes of purple and red dying out faster than the red did in the white.  “ **Had you not been so protective of your precious**_ **secret** _**she wouldn’t be in danger all the time.** ”_

_He didn’t want this, it had to stop, they had to stop, he didn’t want this, this wasn’t what he wanted, not at all.  “ **Isn’t it, though?  Didn’t you just love the rush of power and the taste of fresh warm blood?  Relished in the strength that came from the blood of the living rushing into you as a sacrifice from your true biggest fans?  Strength and power enough that you could take on anything, deal with anyone that got in your way or threatened what was yours?** ”  The voice that was echoing in his head and shaking his mind was now right in his ear, practically purring with it’s dark sins.  “ **No plant** ,” a blade of green light broken and the wielder impaled, “ **No machine,** ” a gun melted away and a flash of light that left nothing but a cracked pair of glasses, “ **No foolish bookwriter** ,” a suit torn open and the wearer gutted with razor talons as her dying screams echoed into the night, joining countless others, “ **No vampire fool or revenge obsessed girl, no spirit, no human, no being strong enough to take what’s yours, and everything becomes yours.** ” No no no, this was wrong wrong wrong, it was wrong and he didn’t want it, and all that he loved and all that he fought for, all that he protected, all that he bled for was crashing, breaking, tearing, crumpling, burning, burning, burn **ing, everything was burninG MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP!**_

Danny gasped as he bolted up in bed with a choked off scream.  He was in Phantom form and he was having a hard time breathing even though he didn’t need to breathe, the air was so heavy and it wouldn’t go in and he couldn’t _breathe_!  Jazz rushed in and pulled him into a tight hug and he shook in her hold.  Eventually, he didn’t know when, he changed back into his human form and it was easier to breathe because he had to and the air was lighter and Jazz was there and she would always be there and he was safe with her.  He sobbed into her chest until he cried himself to sleep, and when he did, she took him into her room with her and stayed with him until morning.

* * *

 

In an endless world of green, one being of flaming purple and solid black stood, his hands raised in concentration.  The ectoplasm around him shifted and flowed and he focused on the image of what he wanted.  It was basic, archaic by the standards of today, but it worked in his time and it could work now.  What he wanted was not for him but for his Liege, whose distress he could feel even now.  But the Prince was well looked after by the family that he had made for himself, and he had yet to call on the spirit.  So for now, Fright ignored the feeling of his lord in need and focused solely on what he wanted done to help Prince Phantom in the first place. What he built now already was, but the southern fool in charge of it was an enemy of the Prince, so something new would have to be made.  “In the name of Phantom, champion, and prince.”

 

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SORRY FOR MY LATENESS I SUCK I AM SORRY

When Danny woke it was in the middle of the morning, and surprisingly, his sister’s room and arms.  If it weren’t Saturday and  _ his _ sister, this would have been incredibly confusing.  Of course, with it being Jazz - who was an early riser and hated to waste any morning by sleeping in - he found himself weirded out by the situation anyway.  His groggy mind not pulling up any of the memories from last night just yet, Danny turned intangible and slipped out of his sister’s grasp and rolled to his feet, stretching and yawning as he headed back to his room.  The sound of his yawn, of course, woke his light sleeping sister, who sat up quickly and gave him a concerned, if sleepy, look.  “Danny?  Are you ok?”

“Yeah,” the raven haired boy gave a sharp twist and let out a sigh as his back gave a satisfying crack.  “I’m good.  Do I wanna know why I wouldn’t be?”  Even without the telltale expression on Jazz’s face, he could have easily answered no for himself.  “Jazz?”

The redhead chewed her lip as she debated telling Danny now or letting it come back to him gradually.  At the realization that with his luck it’d hit him in the shower and he’d slip and crack his head from shock, she decided it was better he know sooner than later.  “Danny… you were having a nightmare and when I came in you were in ghost mode.”  The younger teen slowly relaxed his muscles before they all tensed up again.  “Do you remember what it was about?”

Flashes of blurred memories and a voice that could make a demon shiver flew through the boy’s mind but he forced himself to relax, one muscle at a time, and plastered on a convincing smile for his sister’s sake.   _ No need to drag her down too. _  “Nah, nothing but darkness.  Guess it wasn’t that bad.”  Shrugging he opened the door and flashed her a smile as he closed it.  “Thank you, though, for helping with whatever it was.”  The look on Jazz’s face showed that she wasn’t buying what he was selling, which made the lie all the worse.

“Danny, I can tell when you’re lying.  You’ve gotten better at it, but not that good.”   She crossed her arms, looking far more awake now.  “You can’t keep going like this Danny, all of his stress on top of school and trying to have some kind of normalcy through it all is enough to have made someone snap five times already!  You need to, at _least_ , talk to someone!”

“I’m  _ fine _ Jazz,” he ground through clenched teeth.  He didn’t need this kind of conversation first thing in the morning.  “I don’t need to talk about anything because I don’t remember anything bad happening in my sleep.”  He leveled a glare at her that he hoped got the message across that she wasn’t helping.

“Then why did every visible muscle in your body tense up when I mentioned it?”

“See, keyword being  _ visible _ .”  Jazz narrowed her eyes at the aggressive sarcasm.  “The ones you didn’t see were perfectly relaxed, cause that’s what a stretch is; tensing and relaxing.”

“Danny,”  he was starting to get tired of hearing his own name, how fun was that?  “You haven’t  _ relaxed _ in over a year!  I know you haven’t, I’ve seen you-”

“Have you been  _ spying _ on me?!”  Unbeknownst to the siblings, their mother had stopped right outside the door, having wanted to come and check up on Danny.  She would have stepped inside to break up the fight, but that didn’t sound like something Jazz would do.

“You can’t keep bottling this up, Danny!”  It was early, he was being difficult, and Jazz was at the end of her rope - could she be blamed for raising her voice a bit?  “You’ve got to stop  _ something _ before it all comes crashing down around and on you and you can’t dig yourself out!  You have to talk to someone, me, Sam, Tucker, somebody!”  Danny’s glare became more and more profound and his sister was flailing her arms around now.  “You need to either talk to us or-”

“Or WHAT Jazz?  Stop doing what I do?”  He scoffed, crossing his arms as flecks of green bled into blue.  “You know I can’t do that!  This is my fault, my responsibility, and my burden to carry!  If I fall because I refuse to drag anyone further down with me then  _ so be it! _ ”  Danny stormed out of the room and ran to his room, ignoring his mother’s presence.

Slamming the door closed, Danny aggressively grabbed some clothes, rushed into the bathroom so fast no one could stop him, and slammed and locked that door too.  Using intangibility he stripped and turned on the water, getting in right away.  Closing his eyes, the aggravated halfa let the warming water wash away his thoughts.   _ Fenton works fell behind his closed eyelids, statues behind it.  Robed men and red covered blades held as high as the voices praising him. _  He squeezed his eyes closed even tighter and forced the thoughts away.  Then he felt the water change, but he didn’t open his eyes.  Even though the soap smelled like copper and the water felt too thick, too warm, too full of draining life to be just water, he kept his eyes closed tight.  He scrubbed his skin vigorously, and would later be thankful that he healed relatively quickly.  His hands got the roughest of the scrub treatment.

When he walked out of the shower and into his room, he was stopped by Jazz once again, but he didn’t give her time to try and convince him of anything, wrenching his arm away.  “No Jazz, I told you time and time again, stop psychoanalyzing me!”  He grabbed his guitar, ran down the stairs and stormed out the front door, not giving his parents a passing glance.

Walking into an alley a block away from his house, Danny transformed into his ghostly alter ego and took off for the park, still trying to tell himself that it wasn’t his fault that Sadie died.

* * *

 

When Rick woke up to his brother juggling his pillow, wadded up blanket, and pillow case in the air with his brain while working on their laptop, he decided that today was a good day to take a break from his brother.  After breakfast, where the bespectacled twin put every bit of concentration into subtly telling his brother not to tell or show their parents his power yet - a process that involved lots of kicking and attempted twin telepathy - the teen pulled on his boots and jacket, grabbed a random book from the attic and headed out the door with a shout of “Going to the park, remind George to eat!”

“I don’t have  _ time _ for eating, I have to get back all of my stuff!”  George shouted around a mouthful of eggs at him.

They lived rather close to the park, which led straight into the forest that the twins loved to explore so much, so Rick could bury his nose in the book he pulled without having to worry about getting lost.  What he found was more surprising than yesterday.  It seemed to be a handwritten documentation of one Hokolesqua Pate’s experiences with his own supernatural abilities.   _ I never thought that the spirits would choose me to bestow their power upon, but when I was a boy I discovered that if I concentrated hard enough whenever I was in trouble, my mother would suddenly stop scolding me, and I would get away with the little things.  I learned to stop doing that and take my punishments as I deserved them of course, but as I grew older, more things began to happen to and around me. _

_ One day when I woke, everything I owned was floating through the air!  They stopped after a moment, but that day I decided to see if I could make these things happen again. _  “This is amazing… looks like Georgy’s not the first in the family to get into the weirdness.”  Looking up to see that he had made it to the trees, Rick tucked his book under his arm and started jogging.  “No matter the mystery, I gotta be good enough to run from it if I have to.”

* * *

 

After a defeat, Aragon normally would have gone back to his tower and moped about it before having his guards find the fool who dared to best him and have them beheaded.  However, he didn’t have his guards any longer, only his archer and executioner and they were both injured.  With no shelter of his own specifically to retreat to for recuperation, the exiled prince had to find somewhere that no one would find them.  So, he chose the most deserted area of the Spirit World he could think of; Pariah’s Keep.  To be fair, he didn’t know much about the rest of the Spirit World outside of his former kingdom, he kept to his own, so he didn’t know any other places to go.  Of course, the one spirit waiting for him there didn’t seem to care about any of that, and Aragon was reminded that knights were famous for  _ slaying _ dragons.

“Who dares to trespass on this sacred and forbidden land, and wherefore shouldst I allow thou to live?”  Violet flames erupted around the three trespassers who found themselves quickly cornered by the knight.  A glowing green blade was pressed against Aragon’s neck and dark green eyes glared into his own.  “Speak or be transported to thy worst nightmare for the rest of thy days.”

“I come seeking refuge great knight,” The fool prince began, thinking that he might be able to get out of this with his afterlife at the very least.  “For I hast been exiled by mine people, overthrown by mine treacherous sister, and defeated by that half-breed freak Phantom and wilt rest before I challenge him again.”  The knight’s blade lowered and the exile thought that he may have gained an ally for an entire ten seconds.  Then, The knight's blade moved swifter than any fire, his only remaining subjects gone in a trice. Wholly alone, Aragon swallowed faintly as the blade's sharp tip hovered above his throat.

“As a loyal knight and servant of our Prince Phantom, I have a special place for you to reside until his majesty decides what he wishes to do with you.”  A rope of ectoplasm was made and the former prince bound and forced to mount Nightmare in front of Fright.  “If you try to escape, the Prince may not get the chance to dictate your Fate.”

* * *

 

When Danny stopped flying, he had found himself over a small lake in the forest, a bit deeper in than most would be for a jog through the park.  Pulling his guitar off of his back, he saw that it had gone from its black paint finish to a birch white, the strings now resembling threads of ice more than steel.  Taking off his gloves and stuffing them in a pocket that he had found in his jumpsuit, Danny strummed his fingers against the strings gently and found that he quite liked the fact that the ghostly energy didn’t alter the sound that the instrument made much, other than giving it a slight echo that really wasn’t all that noticeable to him in ghost form.  Crossing his legs in the air and positioning his fingers over the strings, Danny closed his eyes and allowed the memories of his nightmare wash over him, letting the emotion come out through his fingers rather than his eyes or mouth.

The strings felt stronger now, the wood almost as if it were still alive, and the music that came echoed his fears and anxieties and regrets perfectly.  The more he playing, the more emotional the music became, and the better he felt as he listened to the wordless feeling bouncing back from the crystal clear water and sturdy trees.  His burning disgust and anger toward the cultists rang out as a sound that an acoustic guitar shouldn’t have been able to make.  The air around the lake chilled as harsh riffs and angry chords echoed across the water.  

Guilt cut through the air as he remembered Sadie’s face and harsh cords melded into unforgiving riffs, low pitch slowly rising.  The water shook beneath him and rippled with the voice of his instrument, crying out for forgiveness, and rejecting it at the same time.

Flowing from high to low, fast and harsh to slow and somber, his music sung out the torture of his soul and everything that heard it beyond himself could truly feel all of it as he played.

When he finished letting out his feelings, a serene Danny flew over to the closest edge of the lake and transformed back into his human form.  A private concert with no audience and a dip in the lake would be the best things to relax him after the stressful week he’d been having.  Danny pulled off his shirt and jeans to reveal the scars that came with the business but it wasn’t like anyone else was there, right?

* * *

 

When Rick settled in his tree branch to read up on his ancestor, he expected it to be quiet, or for the only thing to bother him to be a squirrel or a dryad - yes, he believed they were real, and there was enough magic in the town to stir one into existence at some point - or even a bird flying by.  What he did not expect to notice as he read about Hokolesqua finding an honest to gods, spell and ritual using, witch named Cassandra Rava, was the sound of an acoustic guitar echoing across the lake next to him.  It started out harsh, angry and raw and flowed through several emotional tones that Rick could almost feel in each note, going from sad to angry to scared to exhausted so seamlessly the sound was otherworldly.

When the freshman looked out to the water he was shocked to see the town hero, whom he had caused quite the mess for.  Listening to the angst put to music, Rick heard his brother’s words repeating in his head, along with those of Sam and the newspaper article, and something that he rarely felt itched at the back of his mind.  As the song shifted to something guilty it hit him full force, and he had to close the book as he let the emotion wash over him and wrench hot tears out of his closed eyes as the images from the page came rushing back to him.  Sadie’s cold, lifeless face looking up at him accusingly, a voice that his mind provided saying that it was his fault and if it weren’t for him and his damned joke about demons none of this would be happening.

It was when the music turned to something fearful, and Rick started to feel afraid of  _ absolutely nothing _ that he realized that these emotions weren’t his, they were Phantom’s.  That was another power to chalk onto the list of things they knew Phantom could do.  Secured by the knowledge that he wasn’t actually feeling what he was feeling, Rick let the music wash over him like the tide at the beach, ignoring the voices in his head that said he was in the wrong.  He wasn’t at fault, and though Phantom wasn’t either, it was the hero who was feeling guilty not him.  

This wasn’t the kind of music that could be written or replicated, and it wasn’t the kind that you recorded.  This was music that was purely for expression, to get something off of his chest, and it made Rick wonder what could have brought all of this angst upon their hero.  Had Phantom never seen someone die before?  If it had been him, Rick wouldn’t have been feeling all that good or know how to cope with it right away.  That must have been what happened, he realized, and he felt his stomach twist into knots, even as he denied to himself being the reason for it.  The cultist bastards did this, not Rick.  He had only supplied the knowledge, it wasn’t his fault if the rest of the world abused it.

When Phantom finished up his song and flew over to a spot near the trees that forced Rick to switch branches in order to keep him in sight, the freshman was granted a sight to see.  The guitar was set down against a tree and white rings of light wrapped around the spirit’s torso, spreading up and down and where they passed over changed.  In a bright flash of light, Danny  _ Phantom _ turned into Danny  _ Fenton _ and Rick was left without the words to describe that mind breaking sight.  Georgy wouldn’t believe this.


	12. Chapter 12

At first, Rick simply stared blankly, broken brain trying to put itself back together after it was shattered by the sight of a spirit turning into a human.  A spirit, turning into a human, his brain broke again simply from thinking that.  Then he was staring out of mingled fascination and horror.  Fenton/Phantom’s body was littered with scars and bruises that one would expect to see on a veteran of war, not on a teenage boy.  Cuts laced his sides, burn scars scorched at least three places on his back, leg and shoulder and a semi-circle of scars dotted his arm.  Instead of leaning out to see more like he wanted, Rick remembered that he was not supposed to be seeing this and grabbed his book, climbed down as quickly and quietly as he could, and ran straight home.

_ What could have done all that to him?  Was Phantom always getting hit that hard and it just never showed under the suit?  Why didn’t he put on something more protective or something?  How did any of this even happen? _  All these questions and more raced through his mind as he raced home, swirling and screaming to get his attention more than the others so he could figure it out first but none quite made the cut.

When Rick got home, pausing only for a second when he noticed RAM sticks, two hard drives and a whole motherboard thrown into the trash, he went into the attic and started pacing, trying to control his breathing.  He wasn’t entirely sure how he was still breathing, or if he had done any of it during his sprint straight home.  Pausing to concentrate he nodded and confirmed that yes, he was still breathing, and could still feel his racing pulse throbbing in his chest and legs.  His brain was certainly fried, however, because what he had seen made no sense at all.  How could a spirit and a human be the same person?  That was impossible!  “No, that’s what paranormal scientists classify as impossible… but then again so does anyone with common sense.”  He was muttering to himself now, and that was never good.  “The human body cannot possibly handle the amount of spiritual energy it would take to have the kind of power Phantom does without burning up and dying.  The physical form isn’t that durable!  No, stop shouting before dad calls you crazy.”  He paused in his resumed pacing and took a deep breath, forcing himself to sit down with his legs crossed over each other.  “Just breath and organize, you can figure this out.  Okay, Fenton’s parents are ghost hunters, and they’re also scientists working on ecto based weaponry and other technology powered by ectoplasm, which is a metaphysical manifestation of spiritual energy and the matter of the spiritual plane.  What from that could accidentally turn someone into… whatever Fenton is?”

There wasn’t an error in weaponry big enough that he could think of, and it wasn’t as though there were many things that would transform someone so completely in his memory for him to reference.  Spirituality and science both put this down as something impossible.  Rick simply had no idea what was going on with their town hero.  Luckily, of course, he had more than one brain to work on the problem.

Practically silent through all the rambling and theorizing, George had opened up the attic door to check on his obviously frazzled brother and raised a brow at what he heard.  “You’re not trying to figure out a real life mystery without me, are you Ricky?”  The way his eyes bulged against his glasses, which were one sharp jerk of the head away from falling off with that, was so ridiculous a sight that George couldn’t help but laugh.  Walking over to fix his twin’s glasses he gave the other a questioning look.  “What did you see and why is it impossible?”

“Ugh, that word leaves a horrible taste in my mouth, don’t say it again.”  Rick shuddered and slumped back, hands pressed against the floor behind him for support.  “I was in a tree next to that one lake, and I heard music.”  The bespectacled twin felt and heard his brother sit beside him and a small smile graced his lips.  Computer problems or no, George was always gonna be by his side.  “So I look around, and I see Phantom.”

* * *

 

When Nightmare finally stopped, it was in front of a looming black building of the medieval type, and Aragon knew exactly what was happening.  Nightmare blade or no, he began to struggle with all his might to get out of the bonds that held him, but it was to no avail.  “No!  I just got out of one infernal prison, I shall not go back into another!”  His pride was struck low, but it was still there, and he refused to be imprisoned because of the same brat twice in a row.  “Release me at once!”

Fright glared at the fallen prince as he flailed, or attempted to, in his grasp.  It was embarrassing, really, that this fool would challenge the prince when he was so easily restrained with a bit of ectoplasmic rope and a hand on the back of his robes.  Letting out a sigh, he knocked the ignorant spirit unconscious.  He didn’t need the other to be awake for this.  Dismounting Nightmare and stroking her mane a bit, the knight entered the prison that he had constructed, dragging the fallen prince behind him.  “Lord Phantom shall be pleased that he doesn’t have to deal with the likes of you anymore.”

The pull of the random Saturday summoning was a rather strong one, and as he concentrated hard on the tugging, Danny could tell that whoever it was, didn’t have any intention of hurting him.  So, after phasing off the water from his dip, the ghost boy let his transformation rings wash over him and the summon bring him to the bedroom of some Casper High kid.  Their identity was a bit of a surprise.

The green and white walled room was decked with posters of famous football players, alongside some ballet posters.  A football on the bed, which had swans on it, and some textbooks neatly organized in a shelf on one of the walls.  The person in question just so happened to be Kwan Long, shockingly enough.  “Ah, K͢ẃa̧n̢.  What can I do for you?”  The reverb in his voice was unavoidable but he found it was manageable at least.  Kwan rarely did anything bad to him or any other nerds around school and was a generally nice guy, so Danny didn’t feel like freaking him out too much.

“I’d like to make a deal, my first letterman jacket that I’ve had for all of freshman year and this year at school in exchange for the answer to a question I have and some conversation.”  Kwan held up the jacket and his hand, which was still letting out tiny droplets of blood, and gave the hero a pleading look.

“Throw in some kind of food, and you’ve got yourself a D̕e̡àl.”  Danny’s hand lit up with blue light and they shook on it, the jacket vanishing in a puff of snow.  The symbols of his circle dialed down to a low glow and the light in the room brightened electricity instead of just candle light as the halfa floated out of the circle and sat in the air.  “So, what’s on your mind football star?”

“What do you have against my friend Dash?”  Phantom blinked in surprise and Kwan shrugged at his curious look.  It was better to just get straight to the point, he felt.

“Dash, Dash…” Danny pretended to think about it, not expecting the question really.  Kwan was the smarter jock, though, and it only made sense that he noticed the ghostly teen’s animosity towards his friend during the last summon.  “Blond, quarterback, teddy bears, bullying jerk who hurts others for pleasure?”  The cringe that he was met with told Danny Kwan got it loud and clear.  “Your friend isn’t the nicest of guys.  I’ve seen him picking on kids around the school for no reason, and I’m not a fan of bullies, especially ones who are phans of me.”

“Ok, so I admit that Dash isn’t the nicest guy to everyone,” that was obvious if one just looked at him when he walked through the halls.  It was also something that he was working on lessening in his friend since Dash had plenty of potential in cooking, and he wasn’t gonna make it there if someone snapped and called the police on him for harassment.  “But he’s not  _ that _ bad a guy when you get to know him.”

“When we met we got shrunken down, and at the end of it all, he asked me if I wanted to stick around to shove Fenton’s face into the toilet for giggles.”  Danny wasn’t letting up on this, and if Kwan was going to ask, he would get an answer.  A bitter one.  “At Fenton’s house.   _ For giggles. _ ”

“I’m working on getting him to be nicer to people!”  The sophomore sighed and scrubbed a hand down his face.  “His dad always told him that if someone was weaker than him that they should listen to whatever he said and if they didn’t he should make them.  I’ve been trying to teach him out of that for a while now, and recently it’s working.  He hasn’t done anything mean to any of the nerds or geeks in a whole month!”

“Besides calling them nerds and geeks and losers,”  Danny slid onto his side and rested his chin in his palm.  “That’s bully enough for me to still not like him.”  It was true of course that Danny noticed Dash was being a lot less physical about his bullying beyond a few shoulder checks when they passed in the halls, which the hero barely noticed since he was much tougher than the jock realized, but that didn’t mean he had completely turned a new leaf.  Dash was still a thorn in Danny’s side whenever they were near each other, and he wasn’t going to change his opinion so quickly.  “Self-esteem and confidence are fragile things sometimes, especially when worn on by harsh words everyday.”

Kwan sighed and headed for the door to his room, realizing that this was going to be  _ quite _ the conversation, and he should pay the hero in full before they got anymore into this.  “Any specific food?”

“Surprise me,” Danny grinned, actually curious as to what the football player would make.  “Dash can cook, surprisingly, so what can you do with food?”

* * *

 

“Well, if we wanna figure out how it happened we have to look at everything that’s known about the Fentons.”  George pulled out his phone and tapped away at the screen with a speed that would make a chiropractor cringe.  “We’d also have to go through a bunch of info on Danny himself to see when the change happened though it was most likely when the ghost attacks started.”

“How are you so calm about this?”  Rick was bewildered now, not just by their discovery, but by how efficiently his brother was working, even with his main means of research wiped clean of it’s capabilities.  “This is like, not the time to be all calm.”

“The time to freak out is when I’m not looking for information Ricky, never during the search.”  It was almost disappointing that his brother didn’t pick up on that over the years but George was sure that he’d figure it out eventually.  “What do we know about Fenton beyond his being Phantom?”

“Not much, just that he’s socially invisible and only seems to have two friends besides his sister.  And he’s acing astronomy, so that’s something significant.  I believe.”  Rick pushed up his glasses a bit as he concentrated through the excitement and bafflement, trying to remember what he had looked up on the older boy himself as well as what was in the Foley files.  “His grades were nigh straight A before, but shortly into freshman year, around the same time ghosts started showing up, they took a dive like a stone.  Pickin up recently, though.”

“I remember going into the school database for info too, and Lancer noticed he had insomnia last year,” George scrolled through the results of his search rapidly and stopped on one that looked promising.  “His current teachers agree… damnit, there’s nothing on the internet and hacking into something like their computers is impossible on a phone.”  He shoved his phone into his pocket with a frustrated growl.  “Ok, theories, until we get solid evidence.”

“Well, maybe he died and there’s enough ectoplasmic residue in the lab that it got on his body and his ghost was able to go back into his body without destroying it?”  It made sense, he would have been able to form and fuse with himself quickly enough that no one would notice the difference.  “He’s pretty pale as Fenton so maybe it’s because he’s dead, and his spirit is as tan as he would be if he was still alive?”

“Maybe some ectoplasm got into his bloodstream and it mutated him somehow?”  George remembered something about that kind of thing happening last year before they got into the school.  “Wasn’t there some school-wide breakout of a ghost bug that gave everyone random ghost powers, even though the police didn’t believe what the students said happened to them?”

“Didn’t belie- do we live in a cartoon or something?”  Rick growled and pulled at his hair a bit before taking a slow deep breath.  “Not like this town is haunted twenty-four seven by ghosts or anything, high schoolers are just making everything up.  Ok, let’s go with ectoplasm in his blood maybe, wouldn’t that kill him?”

“The odds that it would are higher than I have time to count out, but on the off chance that it didn’t exactly kill him…”

“The spiritual energy held in the ectoplasm could have merged with his blood and bled into his whole body, infusing him with power like he has as Phantom!”  The twins high-fived each other out of habit, feeling they were good on their theory.  It was all that made sense after all.  Rick paused then, tilting his head to the side.  “How many cuts must he have had all over him to get enough ectoplasm into his blood.  He’s pretty damn powerful.”

“Maybe…” the tech shrugged as he thought, “he was attacked by a ghost and his friends helped him get rid of it but he got the brunt of the attack?”

“And then maybe he fell during the attack and the ectoplasm in a beaker might have fallen ontop of him?  But what about his parents?  I checked some news stuff and the Fentons are no supporters of Phantom.”  Rick leaned back on his arms and stared at the ceiling.  “How do they not know that their own son is some kind of spirit?”

“Well ya know, maybe they weren’t home when it happened.”  George rolled his eyes at the scoff he heard and decided to pretend that it was a cough from all the dust in the room.  “ Even super geniuses who can create technology powered by energy from another dimension need to go grocery shopping or just… ya know, out.  They’re a married couple, couples date even after marriage.”

“Whatever man.”  After considering leaning back further to the point that he was laying on the floor, Rick remembered that he had yet to bring a broom up here and shifted his weight to one hand, examining his other palm and making a face at all the dust.  “So, Danny and his friends were in his parents’ lab when a ghost attacked, they all dealt with it but he got some big bad cut, possibly on his head or chest where it would have the most impact, and crashed into something that would make a bunch of ectoplasm fall onto him and into his wounds.  It mixed with his blood, and instead of killing him, it gave him the powers of a spirit and the form of one.”  He summed it all up and pushed up his glasses to keep them from falling off of his face.  Running and looking in various directions rapidly must have loosened them up.

“That’s the theory we’ve got.”  George nodded and typed away on his phone, sighing at the loss of his precious laptop.  “And until I can get a new laptop and remake all of our files from memory, it’s the  _ only _ thing we’ve got.  Stupid Tucker and his stupid skills.  Though I can see where they might come in handy in a ghost fight honestly.”

Rick snorted and raised a brow at that.  “Really?  Doesn’t Phantom just punch Technus until he stops fighting?”

“Yeah but I mean that other ghost, the robot one.  Shutting him down wirelessly would save a lot of time and bruises.”  George waved his phone around with a grin before he remembered something that was probably important.  “I once heard that robot ghost call him a halfa!  What might that mean?” George raised his arms in defense as his brother punched him for withholding information.  “I didn’t know what it meant and just thought it was a slur!”

“We don’t hold back info on stuff like this bro, you know that.”  Rick huffed as he backed off.  “I guess it means that they know he’s half spirit half human and dislike him because of it?  It could totally still be a slur.”  They nodded to each other, not putting much more thought into that since it was already hard just thinking about something being half spirit half living without their brains shutting down was almost impossible.  They stared at the ceiling, which as always held no answers.  It was Rick who asked the important question  “So, what should we do?”

* * *

 

In the end, Kwan had promised to get Dash into a deal of his own after explaining to him what Phantom really thought of him and then the ghost boy asked about the perfect blend of Football and Ballet in the jock’s room.  “Well, at first, I just joined up cause my mom said that it would help with football, flexibility and all that you know?  But it got pretty fun after a while, and I’m actually thinking about maybe switching from football to ballet altogether if a recital and game schedules clash, cause I’m doin pretty good at dancing and it’s less of a risk of getting hit ya know?”

“Yeah, that sounds like fun.”  Danny smiled and nodded, glad to be off the subject of Dash for a minute as he finished up the last of his crepes.  It was a great surprise, he had to admit.  “Can I see a bit of dancing?  I’ve never really seen any ballet, but I know it takes a lot of grace, and I was hoping to see that in action.”  Coincidentally, Danny had his guitar with him when he was summoned, and this was the perfect opportunity to play it.  As he pulled it around to his front, his ghost sense went off and he let out a frustrated sigh.  It had been a while since he got any fights.  “Well, looks like time’s up Kwan.  Maybe another time?”

“Sure, a dance for a song.”  Kwan smiled and waved as Phantom flew out the window, the circle dimming back to normal chalk, the candles blowing out as he did.  After a bit, the smile on his face faded and he pulled out his phone with a sigh.  “If this doesn’t have any impact then I don’t think anything will.”  Dialing the number he waited for two rings and took a breath when his best friend picked up on the third.  “Dash?  Yeah, we need to talk.”

When Danny finished up sucking the weird giant ghost cat into the thermos, he sighed and flew over to the park.  He didn’t want to go home and dump off the ghost, his parents were more than likely in the lab working out a new way to summon him and force him to stay when summoned.  It wasn’t safe to just keep an occupied thermos on him, though, so he was left wondering what to do.  “This would be so much easier if I could make portals like my future self… wait a minute!”  He almost smacked himself in the face when he realized he had the perfect teacher for something like that.  Danny crossed his arms in thought, wondering how exactly calling on Fright Knight would work.  Shrugging his shoulders, he went with the first thing that came to mind.  “Process of elimination.”  Clearing his throat and concentrating on what it felt like when he addressed Fright as his knight for the first time, Danny’s aura shifted to blue and his voice echoed when he spoke.  “ _ Fright Knight, I need to speak to you. _ ”  His voice projected further than it usually did, and the ghostly sound effects amplified his call.  It was almost a whole minute before something happened, cutting off the halfa’s musings on what else to try.

A swirling vortex of purple energy appeared several feet away from him in the air and Fright flew out of it, for once not riding Nightmare.  He immediately bowed to his prince and lowered his head, though he noted quickly that there was a claw mark on his leg.  “My liege, how may I, your humble knight, serve you?”

“ _ There’s something that you can do as well as myself, and I think it’s time I learned how to do it. _ ”


	13. Chapter 13

It took several hours before he finally managed portals, and when he did the ghost boy was too tired to make use of his new skill.  Regardless, Danny had learned how to make semi-stable portals into the Ghost Zone.  The only real issue was that his portals always opened to random spots in the Zone.  “Thank you Fright, but I think I’m going to call it a day.  I’m feeling pretty wiped.”  He nodded to the knight when he was bowed to and was about to fly back home as Fright opened his own violet portal to his part of the Zone when the halfa remembered something.  “Oh, and Fright?”

“Yes, my liege?”  Fright stopped and turned to his lord, unseen brow raised.

“I plan on giving Princess Dorothea a visit tomorrow, and if you could make sure they know that you aren’t an enemy ahead of time, I’d really appreciate not having to stop a fight from breaking out.”  His aura reverted back to white as he relaxed, but Danny waited for Fright’s response before turning to leave.  He wasn’t that kind of prince after all.

“Of course mine liege, I shall make mine allegiance to thou known to the princess and her subjects.  May the stars watch over thou, prince Phantom.”  Fright bowed once again before disappearing into the portal.  Once on the other side, in front of the prison that he was still working on to make it more comfortable for him to stay at when he needed to for extended periods of time, he stroked Nightmare’s muzzle before mounting her.  “Come, Nightmare.  I must meet with lord Phantom’s allies in the time locked lands of Dorothea.”  She whinnied loudly before taking off, the ghostly horse somehow knowing where everything in the Spirit World happened to be.

It wasn’t as long a ride as the trip to the far frozen had been, and soon they were at the gates of Dorothea’s kingdom.  The knight dismounted and strode forward with all the pride that came with being who he was.  Even if it was to prevent himself, the spirit and embodiment of terror, from being feared, this was a mission from his prince, and the need to obey his lord overwrote that to be a force of horror.  When the guards lined up to stop him, pathetically weak as they were, Fright restrained himself from drawing SoulShredder and sending them to their worst nightmares.  One spoke up as though they could not be breached, a commendable mentality at least.  “Halt! Who goes thither, and what business hast thou in our kingdom?”  Fright sized them up before answering, taking in the chainmail shirts and glowing spears.  They were hardly armed enough to deal with a threat like him.

“Hold, guard.  I am the Fright Knight, here at the request of our lord Prince Phantom with a message for Princess Dorothea. Allow me passage in the name of mine liege.”  Fright waited patiently for the guard to murmur among themselves before parting to allow him in.  He strode forward with purpose, ignoring the looks of fear that his presence garnered from the commoners that he passed, regardless of how much delight it gave him to feel.

Once he reached the entrance to the castle he was met with more guards though these ones seemed more competent and had better armor from what Fright could tell.  Swords, shields, actual armor instead of just chainmail - these spirits could provide a real fight.  After explaining once again his purpose, the knight was escorted to the princess’ throne room, where she happened to be finishing up on an issue with a contractor.  The contractor left and the princess raised a brow at him.  “Ah, the Fright Knight.  I see that you aren’t attacking, had you been you wouldn’t have bothered waiting.  State your business, knight of the Fallen Pariah.”  Dorothea’s voice ran with authority, and Fright walked up to a respectful distance before speaking.

“Hail, princess of the time locked lands, in accordance with my lord Phantom’s plans, I come here to tell you now, so long as the Prince does not order me, I shall not harm thee."

Blinking a few times in surprise, Dorothea gave him a short nod.  "I see, so Sir Phantom has become Prince?  I take it that he is aware of this?"  While Dorothea knew that the Fright Knight was not one to waste words and time on lies, she also didn't trust him much.  Bright red eyes scrutinized the knight before them as he nodded, watching for any signs that he was being dishonest.

"Of course.  The moment I felt my lord acknowledge his place, I knew it time to reveal my face."

"That is wonderful news dear knight," Dora smiled brightly, ready to spread the news to her people, before narrowing her eyes at the black clad spirit.  "But, if you prove yourself a threat to my people," her eyes became slits of red, "know that I shall not hesitate to protect them."

Fright nodded in respect for the Princess who would threaten him before turning to leave.  He had more work to do that the Prince did not yet know of, and if Fright had anything to say about it, he wouldn’t until it was finished.

Once the knight was outside of the castle, and Dora had one of her scouts confirm that he was out of the kingdom, she turned to one of her servants with a smile.  “This is wonderful news!  Announce it to everyone in the kingdom that Sir Phantom is now the Prince of the Zone!”  The servant bowed deeply before running off to make the announcement and Dora heard her ladies-in-waiting tittering amongst themselves, most likely making up new gossip.  Regardless, it would help, especially if the news deterred Phantom’s enemies from attacking him in the human world anymore.

* * *

 

Danny landed in the alley near his house where he usually did when he transformed and let out an exhausted sigh before heading inside.  He was feeling better, and learning a new power was always good if an exercise in frustration.  Now he could go into the ghost zone without risking capture by his parents and visit Clockwork to ask him why the hell he hadn’t said anything about this summoning business.  “Woulda helped to know that people can yank me out of my room for whatever reason they choose in advance.”  Opening the door, which in retrospect was a bad idea for a halfa on its own with how his house was, told Danny that he should have gone through the garage door.

Jack and Maddie were standing in the middle of the room with green screened tablets in hand, surrounded by the many ecto guns built into the walls of the house.  When they turned to look at him, he remembered why he had left the house without breakfast, and his stomach felt a bit less full.  Clearing his throat he tried to pass off their looks as something normal and beelined calmly for the kitchen.  

He made it about three steps.

“Daniel James Fenton!” 

Turning to his mom and dad, he could see the worry in their faces and felt another pang of guilt hit his heart.  Maddie grabbed his face and tilted it this way and that, checking for anything that might have been wrong with her baby boy before sighing in relief at finding nothing there.  Good, he was unharmed at least.  Then came the other part of being a parent as she leveled him with a glare.  “Where on earth have you been young man?  We’ve all been worried sick and your sister wouldn’t tell us anything about what you were yelling about.  What is going on?”  Maddie wasn’t the most attentive to anything else when she found a new project to focus on, she knew that.  She still made them meals and even helped Danny with his homework on rare occasions, but even she still noticed the limping and the bruises that he tried to hide.  She assumed it was bullying and had gone to the principal with Jack forty-seven times now.  Jack thought he might be out ghost hunting in secret but that couldn’t be it - he wasn’t there in the fight with the dragon ghost even when his sister and best friends were.  Even so, Maddie didn’t want to entirely believe that it was anything more serious than failed attempts at parkour with Sam.  Now though she could tell that he was thinking up something to tell them, even if it was only a minute tell.

“Nothing mom, just some stuff with grades and school and everything.  I was just feeling a little stressed and Jazz blew it way out of proportion.”  Danny loved her a lot, but Jazz was prone to blowing up every single one of his problems even before his ghost powers.  “I also may have been planning to give ziplining a try and she probably thought I’d get hurt or something.”

Maddie relaxed somewhat, but Jack’s frown deepened a bit.  “That doesn’t explain where you’ve been all day or why you haven’t called us.”  The expressions on Danny’s face changed to something unrecognizable to the Fenton patriarch before it went blank and clueless and transitioned to realization so smoothly he almost believed it to be real.  He really wished that he did.

“Oh yeah, my phone!  I guess I left it here…” Danny rubbed the back of his neck in genuine embarrassment.  He wasn’t thinking about talking to anyone when he stormed off that morning.  “And I was in the park, playing my guitar for a bit.  Music doth soothe the soul, ya know?”  Danny didn’t like the way his parents were suddenly paying attention to his actions.  What happened to being unaware of his absences and constant exhaustion?  That made being a superhero so much easier.  “Anyways, I think I’m gonna go get some toast and then go up to my room, ok?”

“Well alright…” Maddie consented, still concerned but not wanting to push her baby boy any further away from them than he had already done himself.  “Just try to be nicer to your sister, please?  She’s just worried for you, Danny.  And don’t be afraid to come talk to us anytime you need help with your homework ok?”

“Yeah, we  _ are _ scientists after all,”  Jack added in with a bit of a smile full of pride.  “I happened to skip multiple levels in all college math classes and made the teacher cry a few times.”  The most sincere smile Danny's face made in a while spread.

“Right, I’ll remember that next time I have some problems with school stuff.  Thanks, Dad, Mom.”  Danny gave them both a quick hug before heading into the kitchen and grabbing some bread.  “You guys are the best!”  It wasn’t often he got to mean it when he said something to his parents, it felt good.

* * *

 

Walking into his office once again, Vlad fumed with fangs bared and red eyes ablaze.  “This makes absolutely no sense!  Who could have taken it?  Who would be foolish enough to take the crown?”  

The light faded from his eyes and he asked himself in a far calmer voice, “Why do I even care about the crown?  Ruling an entire world would be far too much work for any one being.”

“ _ Too much for a lesser being, but I am more than any other!  I outplayed Pariah Dark and defeated him with a pawn! _ ”

“But Daniel is so much more than a mere pawn.”  The frustrated mayor stopped in his pacing and glared at the duplicate he had subconsciously created as he spoke to himself.  He was beyond grateful that no one barged into his office without asking since there would be far too many questions asked were anyone to see the mayor of the city arguing with a vampiric ghost.  “And my focus needs to be on how to deal with this summoning nonsense that has cropped up whilst I searched for that blasted crown.  It can wait until after this situation is dealt with.”

“ _ It can wait for my  _ personal _ attention, but I will not have it slip out of my hands whilst I assist some foolish child that lacks the will to deny some petty pissant.  I shall find Skulker and get him on this.” _  Plasmius vanished in a swirling cloud of red smoke and Vlad was left alone with his own, his thoughts free of ghostly influence for once.  

Rare was the occasion that he could think without hearing that painful throbbing in his head that came from ignoring his obsession in favor of paying attention to his business and his life.  Grabbing the newest newspaper in his office he sighed.  “Someone has already died because of this, and I can’t imagine he’s taking that well at all.  The first step to dealing with this problem is figuring out the other components of this circle.”  Opening up his laptop, Vlad synced up to his spy bots and flicked through to the one that he had planted in Daniel’s room.  With a bit of fast forwarding, he finally found what he was looking for, and pulled up a program to render the image properly.

A crown, a thorned rose, a motherboard, a book, and a snowflake.  A frown found its usual place on the half ghost’s face as he thought over the implications of each symbol.  Most could be explained simply by looking at his friends and ice powers, but what the crown could mean was troubling.  He didn’t dwell on that, however, because he noticed something on one of the other cameras.  “My my, young Jasmine.  Quite the clever girl you are, finding that connection.”  The simple image of a gun appeared on the circle and it changed dimensions to compensate for the addition.  “That reminds me that I haven’t gone over what Valerie has been up to lately… Now  _ this _ is interesting…”

* * *

 

She didn’t know why she had started heading towards the states, but if you asked her, Elle would tell you that running into a ghost only a mile into the trip was completely unexpected.  Now one might expect that a half ghost clone should anticipate a ghost on her journeys, but one would be wrong since there were only two stabilized portals into the spirit world on Earth.  So, when a big green hound flew out of nowhere and tackled Elle to the ground, in human form, in the middle of nowhere street, she could feel her pulse spike.  Kicking it in the face was an entirely justified reflex once she was in Phantom form.

When the hound whined at her and gave her the eyes, the halfa may have felt a little bad.  “Ok Fido, what do you want?  I don’t have any chew toys for you to play with, and that includes me.”  It nudged her then, before mouthing Elle’s sleeve and running off again.  This time, at least, she was a bit prepared and flew along with it.  Phasing her sleeve free, Elle grabbed onto the collar that adorned the hound’s neck and decided to ride it.  “This wasn’t the trip I was expecting, but a free ride is a free ride…  Whose dog are you?”  Reaching down to grab the tag on the collar, Elle’s jaw nearly dropped when she saw the very same symbol that was on her chest.

Before she could comment on that, the eerie green glow of a portal to the ghost zone came up, and the hound took them straight into it.

* * *

 

Jack went over the symbols and the notes they had made one more time before Maddie brought it up.  “Jack, do you remember why we kept going with the portal after the incident with Vlad?”  He stopped and looked over at his wife with a sigh, the usual jolly smile that was on his face most of the time absent.  “Why we kept this one on after the ghosts started coming through and terrorizing the town?”

“Because Mads, we’re not letting a little setback stop us from doing our research on ectoplasm.”  Maddie’s blank expression remained neutral, something that Jack wasn’t sure he liked.  “We set out to prove to the world that ghosts exist, the government is backing us up if we can get a large enough ectoplasmic energy source and we’re not backing down because of a spook.  Whoever we might encounter when we go in there, is up to chance.”  She knew what Jack was thinking when he said that, it was the same she had been thinking when Jazz confronted them.

“No matter who they used to be, they aren’t with us anymore, right?”  Jack nodded and beamed when Maddie let a smile slip on her face.  “Then let’s catch us a ghost, shall we?”

* * *

 

Going to Brazil? Easy to manage for a half-ghost with a cute face.  Going into the ghost zone on the back of some random dog?  A horribly dangerous thing for a half-ghost with little ghost fighting experience.  This was what went through Elle’s head when she found that the dog wasn’t stopping as it ran around the Zone.  “Ok, you’re on the back of a green dog that has your cousin’s symbol on it, in the ghost zone, and you have no idea where it’s taking you.  Time to find that portal and head back to the human world!”  Elle let go and floated up, watching the hound continue on for a while, unaware that she was no longer riding and turned back to where it had pulled her into the zone from.  The portal closed almost the instant that she looked at it.  “Joy, I’m stuck here.”  A wet pressure on her cheek notified her that her escort had noticed her absence finally.  “Well, at least, I’m not alone.  So, you know where you’re going?”

Fido, she had decided to call him, barked and turned back in the direction of where he had been trying to take her in the first place.  Shrugging, Elle climbed onto his back and patted his head.  “Alright then, take me there then, but if I have to deal with some stupid ghost villain, you’re not getting any treats.”  Fido barked at her as he started running through the ethereal energy that made up the Ghost Zone.  They passed an observatory that was covered in inky darkness with stars all around it, shifting and moving as though it were the night sky itself, a giant tree so big she couldn’t see all of it clearly that looked like it had winds blowing violently around it all the time, and even a floating island that looked like it had a whole farm on it, ghost cows and all.

Overall, the trip wasn’t that bad.  Until of course a giant six-legged purple panther with pounced out of nowhere and swatted at them with its clawed paws.  That was less pleasant.  Fido dodged out of the way just in time, but the panther wasn’t giving up just yet.  “Wow, first a dog, now a cat. I’m an animal magnet huh?”  Elle charged up a blast and flew up off of the hound’s back as the big cat made for another swing, shooting it in the back of the head as it made to snap its jaws at Fido.  A giant tail swung into her back, knocking Elle flying.  When she regained her balance, the ghost girl had a volley of ghost rays charged and ready, but Fido was already on the attack.  “C’mon, c’mon… move it Fido!”  Seeing he heard her, Elle launched a volley of ectoblasts, each hitting the injuries the dog had made as soon as he moved out of the way.  With one last blast to the panther’s face, Elle grabbed onto Fido’s collar.  “Move it, move it, move it!”

Once she couldn’t hear the roaring and was sure that the giant cat was gone, Elle relaxed a bit and looked around at where Fido was taking her.  He seemed rather determined.  A glance around revealed a shock.  "Woah! That's new?" A massive black and purple gothic structure stood starkly against the green of the land of the dead. Equally enormous walls surrounded it like some sort of medieval castle, but it had no high towers or turrets. The building crouched low and squat, built of seamless bricks and narrow stripes of windows. Cautiously Elle guided her companion closer, curiosity winning out over fear of the foreboding place.  She had already fought the cat, why not join it?

A thin, haggard face barred with gray, lank hair appeared behind one of the windows, equally barred with some unknown black metal. Elle shrank back from one gnarled hand as a ragged nail jabbed in her direction.

"You! Girl! Release me at once or suffer the consequences!"

"Who faded and put you in charge?" Elle snarked.

"I am Prince Aragon and I demand of you filthy wrench to open this door!"

"Like you're in any position to order anyone." Raising her voice, she added, "The door's on the inside stupid. I can't reach it!" Then she turned to Fido. "Come on let's get out of here."

If this was Walker's infamous prison, she wanted no part of the rule-mad ghost. But no white-suited warden showed himself. Instead, at the prisoner's commotion, Elle heard the snap of wings.

An enormous steed, aflame with vivid green fire, massive fangs bared, charged and she brought upon her back an equally massive knight all in black armor, royal gaze narrowed.

"Faster Fido, get away." Flattening herself, Elle let the hound fly as fast as it possibly could, adding her own speed to it by turning her legs into a ghostly tail and taking flight herself. If that really was the Fright Knight Danny had told her about a few months ago, she didn't want to have to fight him.

"The Fenton portal!" She shouted when it finally came into view. "In there!"

* * *

 

“So, just to make sure I remember this right,” Danny got his own journal that he usually reserved for the song lyrics that even Sam and Tucker didn’t know about and tore out a fresh page to write it all down as he spoke over the phone.  “A dollar sign, a flaming F, a scepter, a string of D.N.A., and a screwdriver are what we have to make the circle so far, right?”

“Check,” Tucker nodded over the video chat screen, going over his own checklist.  “All we’re missing is a chant and a center symbol.  Once we have those we’re good to go.”

Danny nodded and turned his eyes to Sam, who had her own journal in her lap, usually reserved for poems, now occupying several attempts at a chant that could summon Vlad.  Most were crossed out.  “And Sam?  Where are we on that chant?”

The goth sighed heavily with the weight of her annoyance with trying to figure this part out.  “If I knew more about him personally I might be able to think of something that sounds right, but we don’t know him as a person that well.”  And wasn’t that a weird problem?  They knew his obsession, they knew his usual methods of trying to deal with that obsession, but nothing about him as a person.  There was something about that that irked her.

“Yeah well, I guess the plan’s on pause until we can… does anyone else hear that?”  Danny tilted his head, ear towards the window, but neither of his friends seemed to hear what he was hearing.

“No… what are you hearing Danny?”  Tucker looked like he had opened up another window to start typing down the starting details of a possible new ghost power while Sam had grabbed her book on spirituality.  “Any words or distinctions?”

“Yeah, it's… I hear screaming.”  Danny’s eyes widened in realization and he pushed back from his spot at the computer.  “Guys, I don’t know how but I can hear screaming and I have to go!”  The halfa transformed as he ran for the window and leaped through, zooming off to where he somehow knew it was coming from.  It wasn’t a normal scream that Danny had heard either.  It had echoed in his mind until he left the room and that made the hero think his ghost half was being drawn to something.

As he flew, the pull on Danny’s core got stronger and stronger until finally he saw blue skin and overalls, as well as glaringly white fighter jets that shouldn’t have been in an area populated by civilians.  The prince’s eyes burned blue like fire and one hand lit up with energy as he sped up.


	14. Chapter 14

“Phantom!  What are you- ah!?”  Box Ghost had little time to say anything else as a ghost ray, fired from Phantom’s eyes, shot past him and through the engine of one of the jets.  His frantic flight jerked to a stop as Phantom grabbed the strap of his overalls.  Just before he shouted at the halfa for capturing him a shield protected them from the fast approaching missile launched by the second jet.  Once the jarring of the shockwave wore off, the shield was turned into a spear of energy that sliced through the other jet’s engine and a pair of clones split off to catch and deal with the GIW agents.  That was quicker and more efficient than Boxy had seen the teen deal with a hostile before, even the human ones.  “... Phantom?”

“Are you hurt?”  Danny turned his icy hues on the older ghost and looked him over for injuries.  He saw a bruise on the other’s cheek and a burn mark on his clothes, most likely from the ecto-rifles

attached to the jets.  If there was any other damage, he couldn’t see it.

“I, the Box Ghost, am fine young Phantom!”  He nodded, shouting as usual.  “But I am curious, why are you here helping me?  Do you not usually fight to protect the humans from nefarious ghouls such as me?”  The spirit’s eyes flicked from his unlikely savior and the Guys in White that his duplicates were now fighting off with little effort, mainly drawing the fight away from them.

Danny blinked at that and raised a brow.  Though loud and dramatic as ever, Box Ghost sounded genuinely surprised and curious as to why the halfa was helping him, and even a little suspicious.  That made him cringe a little on the inside - he shouldn’t use Boxy as a stress reliever if he was getting this kind of reaction because of it.  “I help people who need help Box Ghost, and you happen to be one of those people.  What were you doing around the Guys in White, though?”  Danny winced as he felt one of his clones get struck in the core and the energy was reabsorbed.  “These guys are a nasty piece of work.”

“The Box Ghost was not doing anything near these cylindrical weapon using ghost hunters!  I was merely grabbing the tubs of ice cream and pickles for my lovely mate, who complains that the ghostly foods of our world do not satisfy her tastes!”  Box Ghost reached into his overalls and pulled out a small box, from which he pulled out a few tubs of ice cream and pickle jars, to Danny’s bafflement.

“Okay… then you go give her those and I’ll deal with the GIW.”  Shaking off his surprise, Danny dove for the agents with a growl, absorbing his remaining clone.  Boxy wasn’t even doing anything wrong, just getting food for the LunchLady.  These white decked morons had no business attacking a non-hostile spirit.

Dodging a shot from one of their ecto-rifles and returning fire, aim on the guns first, the prince snarled at the agents.  “Who the hell do you think you are?! Attacking a harmless spirit who was doing nothing wrong like he’s trying to burn the town down?”  Danny ducked a blast that went flying at his head, cursing those shields of theirs under his breath.  “What gives you the right to attack someone unprovoked?”

“We protect humanity from ecto scum like you,” agent O sneered as he shot at the ecto entity attacking him and his fellow agent.  “Your very existence in this world violates our laws and the laws of nature.”

“If we were defying nature we wouldn’t be able to exist in this world at all!”  Splitting in two, Danny flew in circles around the agents, dividing their fire and building up a charged blast.  “We all have a right to exist in  _ any _ world!  The Box Ghost isn’t even a threat to anyone, you’re just looking for someone to pick on.  What, ectopi too tough for ya?”  He laughed at the scowls that the agents sent his way and aimed at them.  “Well if you think Boxy’s  _ dangerous _ let me show you  _ how wrong you are _ !”  Both Danny and his clone fired off twin blasts of energy that seared through the night sky and collided with blue shields that shook under the pressure and started to crack.  “ _ What’s wrong agent K?  Agent O?  Can’t you just shoot me through your shields like I can to you?  Or is that not something that your ghost fighting tech was made for?” _  The shields shattered and the halfa was behind the agents the second they stopped shifting from the force.  “ _ If you want to fight spirits you’ll have to do it like we do, with no tech, _ ”  The jetpacks turned intangible and went flying into the night for all of two seconds before colliding and shattering into scattered debris.  The Dannys flew down to catch the two falling fools before they made a mess of the sidewalk.

“Release us you putrid ectoplasmic manifestation o-“ K's mouth snapped shut as Danny shook him roughly.  That certainly cut him off, but only to shout wordlessly and think up more insults.

“ _ Are you su _ re that you want me to drop you, boys?”  Danny kept flying down, merging with his clone and carrying both men by their collars.  “We’re still pretty high up…”

“K,” O panicked and shouted at his partner.  “Shut your mouth before we become spots on the ground!”

Danny chuckled at the exchange, especially when K zipped his lip and stopped moving.  “Good to know which one of you is the smart one.  Now,” he growled in their ears, stopping fifty feet over the pavement,  “ _ you’re going to do me a little favor.  You’re going to go to your boss at the Guys in White HQ and tell him that no spirit is to be attacked unless they’re actually doing something wrong.  From now on, I protect both spirits and humans from danger and injustice. _ ”  Concentrating hard, and pushing his powers quite a bit after all of that, the ghost boy turned the agents selectively intangible, letting the weapons they had on them fall to the ground and break.  “ _ Got it? _ ”  He hissed in their ears, voice laced with protective instinct and irritation.  The quick nods they gave were enough for him and Danny set the pair of morons down on the ground and soared home invisibly.

* * *

 

In the center of the observant high council room, a viewing orb had been focused on one Daniel James Fenton for days now.  A certain scarred spirit turned to the one-eyed beings with a smirk on their face.  “As you all can see, Danny is growing into a fine Prince, with a loyal knight to guide him.  He’s even established to the humans that he shall defend his fellow spirits from injustice as he does his fellow man.  We have  _ nothing _ to worry about.”

“How can you be so sure about that Clockwork?”  One of the observants called out, irate and paranoid as always.  “His future self had nearly become a demon in only ten years!  He could be forced on the wrong path at any moment and turn into one in a moment!”

“Kilthala,” Clockwork sighed, a gloved hand on their blue baby soft face, rubbing at their temples.  “Danny did not become a demon, even as Dan, and this Danny shall not turn either.  I am certain because I know how all of this shall turn out.”  They reminded the frantic and frankly annoying Observant that loved to point out little flaws in their logic.  How they loathed Kilthala.  “I know everything.”

“If that is true,” Kilthala pointed out with a glare, “then you know that the boy must be tested, and soon Clockwork!  We must know how he shall react to real threats as a Prince, not as a mere protector of the humans.”

“Of course, I know that, and I know exactly when to start these tests.”  Clockwork glared back, their elder form adding slightly to the effect.  “My dear friends are perfectly ready to test him, but we must wait until the Time is right.  Now if you will excuse me,” they cut off the Observant that was about to make an argument about their choices on who to administer the tests.  “I must be going back to my lair.  Good day to you all.”  Clockwork paused time and teleported to their home, so that they were there one second and gone the next.

* * *

 

Changing back to his human form right over his bed, Danny groaned when he saw the wisps of his ghost sense fly out his mouth.  “Really?  A ghost is in my house right now?  You’re probably right here so let’s just get this over w-”  The ghost boy didn’t get any further in his mini-rant as a big green dog - that wasn’t Cujo he noted - jumped onto his stomach carrying a girl in a black and white outfit that looked strikingly like his.

“Hey cuz, you look like crap.”  Elle laughed as Danny phased through Fido and tackled her to the ground with an amazed grin.  “And you’re heavy too, what kind of halfa is this heavy?”

“The kind with battle bred muscles, that kind ya brat.”  The older half ghost laughed and got his cousin into a headlock, messing her hair up with a noogie.  “How’d you even get here Danielle?  I thought you were traveling all over the world?”

Elle squirmed her way out of his grasp and floated up to sit in the air, legs crossed lotus style.  “I got a weird feeling that said to come see you, so I started heading for the states.”  Pausing, the ghost girl tilted her head and switched to Spanish.  “Aprendí español e um pouco de português en mis viajes.”  The confused look he gave her was priceless.  “And your dog here, I call him Fido, came and found me and one cat fight later, here I am.  Oh, and it’s Elle, not Danielle.”

“So does that mean you were fighting a giant cat,” Tucker’s cut in over Danny’s regularly scheduled response from the computer screen.  “Or that you were fighting a female ghost on your way to the Fenton Portal?  I’m honestly curious, cause we may need to add to our ghost files.”

Danny cringed a bit, just remembering that he had been in a conversation with his friends before he went to save the Box Ghost, and got up to look at the screen.  Sam was looking slightly annoyed, slightly amused and glad to see his as cousin safe and sound like he was.  Tucker looked much the same though his grin held far more mirth than that of their gothic friend.  “Oh yeah, uh, hey guys.”

“You were about to fall asleep with the computer on,” Sam oh so helpfully pointed out, “And I for one am glad that Elle stopped you from snoring in our ears before we had to say anything.”

“Why thank you Sam, it’s an honor to keep your ears safe from the ungodly sound of Sir Clueless’ snoring.”  the ghost girl barely kept herself from laughing and giving herself away to the elder Fentons, who thankfully still had the system disabled while they checked all the hardware, and took a gracious bow.

“Alright,” Danny sighed with a small grin, “can we move on from me being tired and focus on the big green dog on my bed that  _ isn’t _ Cujo?”  That brought a little seriousness to his friend’s faces, and confusion to Elle’s.  “Why do you think he’s mine?”  The halfa’s eyes widened considerably when Elle flew over and turned over the collar tag to reveal his DP emblazoned on the black metal.  “Okay… I can see how you’d mistake it as my dog now.”

“Danny, I hate to interrupt this pet detective moment,” Sam cut in again, sounding almost genuinely sorry to stop them.  “But there’s the slight issue of it being late, and Elle needing a place to stay for the night.  So,” she turned her amethyst eyes on the younger half ghost with a warm smile.  “You know the way to my place?”

“Sam does have a hundred and fifteen rooms,” Tucker shrugged, ignoring the glance that Elle gave him - she didn’t need to know why he knew the exact number of rooms in Sam’s house - and closed out his little program.  “A half ghost could live over there without being discovered easily.”

“Yeah but that can’t be an all that permanent set up guys…” Elle was going to say that she didn’t want to be a burden on them and that she was going to be leaving soon anyways.  Danny beat her to the punch with that one.

“You’re right,” he pulled her into another headlock with a big grin.  “I can introduce you to my parents as a homeless girl that needs to be adopted and with a little convincing you can be a legal addition to the family!  Tuck, can you forge up the paperwork needed for this?”

“Do you even need to ask that question?”  Tucker sounded legitimately offended as he got to work.  “I’ll see what I have for you tomorrow man, night guys.”  With that, he shut down the chat window.

Danny and Elle turned to Sam as the elder halfa absently rubbed Fido’s belly.  “So,” Elle started, deciding to leave the argument about not getting adopted - something she wasn’t exactly opposed to if you asked her, “I can stay at your place for tonight?  As in your big mansion?”

“Yup.”  Sam shrugged as though it were no big deal, “I know it’s not as big as the cheese head’s but its safe and I’ve got things that are actually  _ fun _ over here.”  She waved with a grin, glad to hear Elle laughing.  “I’ll see ya soon, Danny will show you the way here.”  The Goth waved and her chat window closed out.

Danny turned off his computer and headed over to the window.  “We should probably get going now; it’s a miracle that the ghost detectors are still offline for maintenance.”  He turned his gaze to the patient hound on his bed and raised a brow.  “Uh, Fido was it?”  Fido raised his head attentively, in a trained sort of way that was unfamiliar after all the visits Cujo loved to give.  “Uh, I don’t know where exactly you came from, but can you go back there without going through the portal downstairs?  I don’t want my parents to catch you.”  While he had been hoping, Danny’s brows still climbed to his hairline when the hound barked once and jumped off the bed, a portal forming right in front of him.  As soon as Fido was through, the portal collapsed, leaving only one ghost in the room for the alarms to detect.

“Right, well let’s get out of here before the defenses turn back on and fill us with holes.”  The familiar rings of light swept over Danny’s body and he flew out the window, Elle right after him.  Once they were out of range of Fentonwork’s weapons, a range that Danny learned firsthand from a rather painful experience, he broke the slightly awkward silence.  “So, how’s the whole world traveling thing going for you?”

Elle looked up from memorizing the streets and landmarks with brightness in her eyes that had nothing to do with ectoplasm.  “It’s been going pretty great!  I’ve learned a lot about cultures all around the country and in South America!  Molè is delicious, you should try it sometime!”  A look of fond remembrance crossed her face as Elle thought about all the fun things she learned.

“And you seem to have learned Spanish, too.”  Danny grinned widely at her smile, glad to see that his cousin was safe and happy.  “Anything else you learned about besides mid and south American cuisine?”

“Well,” Elle’s smile turned into a wry grin that reminded Danny of every time he started scheming in front of a mirror.  “I learned that the right words and a cute smile can land you with quite a bit of food and a place to stay for the night when you’re tired of using ghost powers for the moment.”  Ethereal green lit up her gloved hand and cast odd shadows over both of their faces.  “I also learned a few things about my powers from spiritualists and shamans all over.  There happen to be people who can tell what we are just by looking at us.”

“Really?”  He frowned at that, arms folding over his chest.  Danny didn’t like the thought of someone being able to see through his human form and look at the ghost beneath.  “How rare are these people?”

“About two hundred people or so this side of the planet.”  Elle shrugged like it was no big deal, even though she very well knew that it was from the scars that her top covered on her back.  “If there were one in Amity, they’d have ratted you out by now you know.”  She could tell from how tense he was that it was a concern.  “Either to phanboy right in your face or to shoot you with an ecto rifle.  But if we’re going on my powers, I learned some things from those Shamans.”

“Oh?  And what did the spiritualists teach the spirit?”  He raised a brow, curious, and did a little loop around his cousin.

She opened her mouth to answer, and blue mist left both of their mouths and they both groaned.  “Joy, a fight.”  They split up just in time to dodge out of the way of a giant green fireball from a large purple monkey with horns on it’s head.  “Why do I attract animals like this?”

“Well, animals love someone with a good personality.”  Danny chuckled as he dodged more fireballs before returning fire with an ectoblast to the side.  “You make him go bananas!”

“You’re really making  _ that _ pun when we fight a forty foot gorilla?”  Using her speed, and lack of exhaustion to her advantage, Elle circled around the beast and hit it with several rapid energy shots.  “I might have to go ape on you for that after this.  Whoa!”  She jerked back and narrowly avoided a swing of the monkey’s tail, only to be knocked down by it’s fast paw.

“Elle!”  Danny split in two, the clone zooming down to grab his cousin while the original charged up a flaming hot ball of ectoplasm, launching it at the monkey’s face and finding it to be oddly fast for it’s size.  “Something this big should not be able to make me miss that badly.”  A paw swatted him away and the ghost boy just barely righted himself before smashing into another building.  “Guess this is a race then.”  Taking a deep breath, Danny flew back into the fight and flew circles around the beast, watching for it’s four limbs as Elle flew around it’s head, launching volleys of ectoblasts at the beast’s head, just barely managing to swerve around each swing of it’s tail.

Ice gantlets formed over his hands and Danny cannon balled into the monkey’s gut, knocking it back in the air at the same time as a particularly nasty ball of energy from Elle struck it in the forehead.  Before Danny could even reach to his belt for the thermos attached to it, the beast righted itself and roared loud enough to shatter glass.  “I think it’s mad now.”  Elle was answered with a ball of lava singing the tip of her ponytail as she dodged it.  “Definitely not monkeying around anymore!”

* * *

 

In the dark basement of a building in the abandoned part of town, men and women gathered around a circle drawn in chalk, several people checking over the symbols and sigils several times and making corrections every now and then.  In the center of this circle were three unlucky people who hadn’t run fast enough, and a dog that was drugged asleep, all of them bound with ropes and zipties.  their cries of distress were muffled by rags and ignored by the black robed people around them.  One such man was starting to have minor doubts.

“Are you sure this is what we should do to please him,” the man questioned the one person in the room wearing a white robe, who was supervising the ones checking the sigils and looking over a book on occult rituals.  “The last ones who tried to do something like this angered him by it and we punished in a fit of vengeance.”  The man, Mark, shuddered as the leader of their cult looked up at him with determined eyes.  “They were lucky to walk away from his wrath alive.”

“And that is why we shall not be calling the King here, but sacrificing the lives of these wretches to him,”  She spoke firmly and without an ounce of hesitation or doubt in her voice or her eyes.  Sarah knew what she was doing, and that it was right.  “Those greedy fools thought to ask for being a part of his court in exchange for one measly life, and that of an innocent at that!   _ We _ are not so foolish as to offer up the lives of the innocent to a spirit who fights for them.”

“Which is why we collected these three,” Mark nodded, his doubt being pushed away again from his leader’s conviction.  “These murderers and rapist who got away with their crimes by the judgment of easily paid off men.  Only the lives of the wicked may be sacrificed to he who protects the good.”

Sarah nodded with a grim look before turning at the announcement that the circle was finally ready.  It was altered from the simple summoning circle that those children had made, but to one of sacrifice and worship, granting power to the being it represented without pulling them to the spot.  “Everyone, gather in your places around the circle!”  A dagger was given to her before the robed woman took her place among the other ten surrounding the circle as Sarah walked into it and approached their captives.  “With this silver blade, I sacrifice these sinful souls to our lord Phantom, the King of Spirits!  Also we offer a companion, so that he not be lonely on his throne!”  She had forgotten who had suggested it, but it made sense to her.  There were reports and pictures of the spirit with a giant green dog, so perhaps he would enjoy having another.  “For Phantom!”  Sarah raised her blade in cheer, her cry echoed by her fellow cultists.

“For Phantom!”  The blade plunged into the dog first, and the sigils began to glow as they began to chant in reverence.

* * *

 

Even with all the power he got from his deals after the first summoning, and Elle’s power to charge him up, Danny was running on fumes after making portals, taking down the Guys In White, and now fighting a lava spewing monkey whose foot was bigger than his whole body.  Elle managed to make a copy of herself and together with his own copy they hammered at the monkey from four points and pushed the fight to the abandoned part of town, but they were still getting smacked out of the air more than he would have liked.  Just as he dodged a paw, the monkey spat out a ball of lava at him and Danny was worried that he was done for.  Then his core suddenly flooded with power, his aura flared and wrapped around him like a second layer of clothing, ice armor forming entirely over his body as ice beams shot out of his eyes, turning just one spot on the lava loogie into rock.

Danny put everything he had into a punch at that spot of rock, and the ball of lava exploded everywhere.  Just then his and Elle’s clones grabbed the monkey’s tail and pulled while Elle herself shot a continuous beam of energy in it’s face.  The combined force pushed it off balance and it was pulled onto it’s back, the clones dissipating into energy that flew back to the originals.  “I’m putting this monkey on ice.”  Aiming where he assumed it’s core was, Danny charged up a ball of condensed cold energy between his hands while Elle kept up her attack, splitting it into two beams to keep pressure on the monkey’s chest and tail.  He launched the ball of energy and it struck the beast dead center in its chest, seeping below the purple fur.

At first, nothing beyond the ape’s pained and raging roars happened.  Then ice spread from it’s chest and quickly covered its whole body from head to tail.  “That took forever,”  Danny grumbled as he evaporated his armor and sucked the spirit into his thermos.  Turning his head away from Elle, he spit out a glob of brownish green goo and made a face.  “I hate when they make me bite the inside of my cheek like that.  Blood is a gross taste whether it’s human or ghost.”

Elle flew up to her exhausted cousin hunched over like she was ready to collapse, the tips of her ponytail blackened from the close encounter with the meteor of monkey spit.  “Is this the kind of thing you have to deal with everyday?  I don’t know how you do it.”  That got a dry laugh out of the older halfa.

“Well, it’s not usually something that big or nasty but yeah the job can get rough.  You ok?”  He clipped the thermos to his belt and started giving Elle a check up, which she took to with much squirming and whining.

“Danny, I’m fine.”  She huffed once he finally stopped, giving Danny an exasperated and concerned look of her own.  “Are you?  You got hit with that tail harder than I did.”

The ghost boy went over a mental checklist as he inspected himself.  His aura was brighter than it should have been after a fight like that, his ribs were definitely bruised, and he would have a headache in the morning without question.  Other than his bitten inner lip and a scratch on his side that was already sealing itself up, Danny was fine.  “No real damage done, I’ll get better in a few hours.  To Sam’s?”

“To Sam’s.”  The younger halfa agreed and they rose up above where humans would be able to see them easily, not wanting to think about the lava that was melting through concrete as they headed off to the Manson residence.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY HOLIDAYS MY LOVELY PHANS! You’re all wonderful and I’m so grateful to have you, so here’s my present to all of you this christmas: a brand new chapter, though it’s not the usual mood for this time of year… then again, considering how everything’s been going so far I take that back

Sunday morning was not the most fun for Danny.  Jazz didn’t seem too keen on talking to him and his parents were in the lab again, which meant that whatever had been keeping them off of the project was no longer in the way of trying to summon Phantom.  Wonderful.  “Jazz, look,” he started off, pouring a bowl of cereal and staring into the rainbow of breakfast food.  “I’m sorry about yesterday, I shouldn’t have blown up at you for being concerned.  But right now we have something going on that I need your help with.”  When he sat down, Danny noted that the book Jazz was reading was on cults instead of one of the usual books on the psyches of young teenagers.  Munching away at his fruity pebbles, the half-ghost waited until Jazz looked up from her book and her coffee and gave him a go ahead gesture.  “Danielle is back,” he paused to swallow.  “And while I know that she’s tough and she can handle herself just fine-”

“You’d feel better if she had a home for herself instead of being on the street,” The redhead finished for him, with a heavy sigh.  Looked like she would have to put her cold shoulder on hold for now.  “So, what’s your plan exactly?”

Danny chewed in thought for a moment.  He had expected her to take a bit more convincing, he even had an offer of psychoanalyzing Elle with his blessing ready to throw out.  “Well, she’s staying at Sam’s for right now, with all the unused rooms and all that.  Tucker is writing up fake papers to prove her existence such as birth certificates and everything, but I was hoping we might get Mom and Dad to adopt her.”  Jazz’s eyes widened a bit and Danny set his spoon down.  “I know what you’re thinking, and I can teach her how to get around all the ghost hunting equipment around here, and she’ll be sticking mostly to just fitting in instead of ghost fighting.”

“Does she know about that last one?”  Based on the way he was scratching the back of his neck, Jazz assumed her little brother forgot to mention that little detail.  “And how do you think that’s going to work exactly?”

“Elle was trained by Vlad to fight me specifically, she doesn’t have the experience needed to be out into the field with me like that.”

“Just like you had so much experience fighting ghosts when you first started out,” Jazz shot back, her voice almost irritatingly calm and even in contrast to Danny’s defensiveness.  “Like Tucker, and Sam?  I’d bring myself into the argument, but I took martial arts with mom and spent an entire weekend with dad while the ghost shield was down.”  The hero opened his mouth but stopped when she held up her hand to stop him.  “I’m not disagreeing with you Danny, I’m saying what she’ll say.  She’s dealt with the streets of America at the age of one and probably had to fight off people who thought they could get away with whatever they want.”

Danny opened his mouth to argue, say that she was too young to ghost hunt - which she was at one-year-old in the body of a twelve-year-old - but he knew that Jazz was right.  Elle wouldn’t listen to him if he said any of that, and he’d rather not start a fight and drive her away.  The stubborn teen slouched in his seat and went back to eating his cereal for a moment, allowing himself to wallow in his grumpiness.  Eventually, the young prince picked his head up off the table and raised his gaze to his sister’s eyes.  “So, any ideas on how to convince mom and dad?”

“Dad’ll be easy,” was the older sibling’s instant response.  She had already been thinking about that.  “Mom will be the one who needs convincing.  Give me a while and I’ll get back to you on that.”  Danny nodded and brought the bowl to his lips, tilting it and his head back so that he could slurp up the rest of his breakfast.  “And, I want to meet my future little sister before mom and dad do, ok?”

When the bowl met the table, Danny nodded and stood.  “Got it.  I’m gonna be out all day today again - with my phone, this time,” he interrupted what he assumed was going to be a reminder.  “I’m gonna take Elle with me when I go too though you might need a pair of Fenton Phones to reach me if you do call.  Channel seven.”  Before Jazz could ask about that, Danny was through the floor, at the vault and snagging another set of Fenton Phones for Elle.

Letting out a sigh, Jazz walked down stairs to see if she could properly assess how distracted her parents were.  Seeing open books everywhere?  Not what she expected to see.  “Mom, Dad, what are you doing?”

* * *

 

Grosvenor Jager was not a fan of the recent reports.  Being the head of the government’s ghost hunting organization, he rather liked hearing good news such as ‘The ghost threat in New Mexico has finally been dealt with’ or ‘we’re getting an increase in budgeting,’ or his personal favorite ‘the scientists have discovered a better way to destroy a ghost.’  What he did not like was when one of his agents that was stationed in the country’s most ghost infested area called him to report another failure.

“ _ Director Jager, sir, the ectoplasmic entity known as Danny Phantom has just declared itself ‘protector of all spirits from injustice’.  It then proceeded to destroy GIW property while we were apprehending another ecto entity that had stolen products from a local store.  Before it could destroy the jets, however, they gave a new reading of level 8.58 on the scale of ectoplasmic power. _ ”  Grosvenor paled slightly at that and pulled up reports from just last month.

“That isn’t possible, agent!  Phantom registered as no more than a 7.4 last month!  How could it possibly have jumped in power so quickly?”  They had never had to deal with any ecto entities so powerful, that weather creature froze the bases over before they could deploy to attack.

“ _ I don’t know sir, but I believe we may need reinforcements here in Amity Park.  It tore through two of our jets with greater efficiency than we’ve seen from any of the ecto entities in the past and took down two of our agents with ease.  We don’t have enough firepower to take it down as we are. _ ”

The director took a moment to think about that, going over scenarios in his head.  The populace of the town was rather fickle in its opinion of the specter and could easily have negative reactions to an occupation of the town by the GIW.  But if they could amass themselves quietly and keep everyone in one spot for just one day… “I’ll get back to you on that.”  He hung up and immediately dialed the number for Axion labs.

* * *

 

“And I want you to meet her too.”  Danny finished up his explanation of how he met Dora to Elle, a fond smile on his face.  “Sam, Tuck, you guys good for watching the town while we’re gone?”

“Yeah Danny,” Sam nodded as she checked the power on her ecto saber.  “We’ll be fine until you get back.”

“And if we need you we can always call you on your Fenton Phones.”  Tucker was putting the finishing touches on a project of his that included plenty of ectoplasm bottled straight from the Zone, and several replicated schematics of Fenton tech at home, so he was on Sam’s computer screen once again.  “But we’ve got us, Valerie, and Jazz if we need her.  I doubt there’ll be a huge ghost attack that we need you here for.”

Everyone stopped and glared at Tucker, who quirked a brow in response.  Elle just happened to be the one to point it out first.  “He just jinxed it.  Does he usually jinx things?”

“It’s why we call him bad luck Tuck.”  Danny rolled his eyes at his friend’s reflexive ‘hey’ and floated towards the window.  “Let’s just go before he does it again, ok?”  With a nod from Elle, the two halfas flew out the window and into the skies.

“So uh, Danny?”  Elle questioned when she noticed they were headed to the park and not the lab where the Fenton Portal was.  “How exactly are we getting into the ghost zone?”

“A new friend of mine,” was all the warning Danny gave before he stopped and his aura shifted colors.  “ _ Fright Knight, it’s Time. _ ”   Elle’s eyes widened almost comically at that and Danny had just enough time to remember that he hadn’t told her about Fright before a vortex of violet energy appeared in front of them and the spirit of Halloween rode out on his flaming steed.

“My Prince,” The black knight bowed to the snow-haired teen before turning his gaze upon the slightly familiar ghost girl.  “I remember you… you were floating around the prison and fraternizing with that arrogant fool Aragon!”

Danny saw the twitch he had memorized from their previous fights and got between Fright and Elle with a shield ready before SoulShredder could get to her.  “Wait!  Fright Knight, this is my …” he turned to the younger halfa for a split second before returning his gaze to the confused knight, shield evaporating.  “My sister, Elle.”

Fright’s eyes widened for a moment before he sheathed his blade and kneeled, which looked odd when they were ten feet in the air.  “My deepest apologies my lord, and lady, Phantom.  I saw your sister passing by the prison that I constructed to hold the fools who would challenge you and-”

“ _ Wait,” _ Danny held up his hand, brow climbing to his hairline.  “ _ You did  _ what?”

“You ordered me to help keep spirits out of the human world, and so I devised a way to do so.”  Fright raised his head, not sure what exactly to expect of his Prince’s reaction.  All that he knew of the boy was that he was compassionate and strong, and at times, Fright thought him a fool.  But now this so called fool was his liege and the knight considered that perhaps he should learn more about his Prince.  “Are you displeased, my lord?”

“ _ That depends, who have you imprisoned so far? _ ”   Elle shivered from hearing Danny talk like that.  What disturbed her wasn’t the echoing quality of his voice, which came with the ghost form even if it was magnified now.  Such an emotional and exclamatory person should not have been able to manage such a neutral tone of voice or facial expression.

“Only the fool who dared challenge your right to rule, my liege.”  Energy gathered around his hand and a portal opened behind the Fright Knight.  “If you wish to see it I can show you-”

“ _ If only Aragon is imprisoned then that can wait until later today, _ ” Danny interrupted with a shake of his head.  “ _ But after the visit to Princess Dora, I do wish to see this prison that you made. _ ”

“As you wish, my lord.”  Fright bowed his head and placed a hand on the portal he made, changing the location to which it lead, and mounted his steed, which kicked her hooves at the ground.  “Would you like to ride on Nightmare as we go to the Time Locked Lands?”

The guarded look on Danny’s face melted away and he looked to Elle, who was staring at him as though he had grown two heads again.  “I’m not sure… would you like to, Elle?”  The older halfa nodded his head to the winged unicorn and his aura shifted back to white.  “Ever ridden a horse?  Or wanted to?”

Elle looked over the dark mare, from her flaming green mane to her leathery bat-like wings, to her razor sharp horn and fangs.  Anger glowed in those red eyes, and though it wasn’t anger directed towards her, the ghost girl didn’t want to risk it.  “No, that’s ok.  I can fly.”

“I will too then, Fright.”  Danny nodded and the spirits all flew through the portal.  On the other side, Danny recognized an area not too far from Dora’s kingdom.  Almost instantly, Danny felt a surge of energy and his aura brightened.  “Whoa, that’s different.  Almost feels like when someone makes a deal with me or when I’m out in the snow.”

“This world is yours, my Prince,” Fright explained as they continued on their way, “and she gives to her kings the most power.”

“Ok, that’s something I’m still confused about,” Elle cut in, drawing the gazes of both Danny and his knight.  “Danny’s royalty in the ghost zone now?  I do believe you forgot to go into detail about that one, Danny.”  She crossed her arms and arched a brow.  “Care to explain?”

“Well, do you remember when I told you about my fight with Pariah Dark that one time you managed to get to a computer?”  The ghost girl nodded and Danny shrugged.  “Apparently when I fought him, he accepted my demand to get straight to the fighting as a challenge to his rule, and then I beat him in the fight.”

“Trial by combat kind of thing then?”  Danny nodded and crossed his arms behind his head.  “So, because the old ghost king thought you were challenging him for the right to rule the ghost zone, and you beat him, you’re now the ruler of the ghost zone?”

“It is a bit more complicated than that princess Phantom,” Fright spoke up, surprising them both.  “But in essence, yes, that is how it happened.  The Spirit World recognizes his majesty as one that she wants to be Her new king, and so here he shall be filled with far greater strength than in the human world.”  Fright noticed that both Phantoms tended to start drifting off when they started talking and simply headed toward their destination.

“Did you just call me a princess?”  Elle almost bumped into Danny when that registered, eyes widening to the size of saucers.  “So because I’m his sister, I’m a princess?”  Fright nodded and Elle went quiet at that.  She didn’t know what to think about her new status as a princess of an entire dimension.

“Wait, so if something happens to me, does her princess status mean that the responsibilities will go to her?”  There was a clear edge of concern and worry in Danny’s voice that Elle was surprised most likely had nothing to do with the thought of him dying.

“That which must happen for you to become king would fall upon the princess to go through with in order to become queen, yes.”  Fright nodded, his tone grim for a moment before an enthusiasm that nearly triggered a defensive move from Danny rung in his next words.  “But you shall not fall so long as I am with you, my prince!”

“We shall see.”  There was that guarded tone again.  What had happened, Elle wondered, to her all too fun to hang out with and cheerful Danny?  “I do not trust easily Fright, especially not a spirit who used to be my enemy and a rather dangerous one at that.”

Normally such a comment would be considered praise for his combat skills and ability to instill terror, but here it merely meant that Fright’s lord did not trust him as a knight should be trusted.  “I understand, my liege.  I shall do all that I can in order to gain your trust.”

“I wish you good luck with that.”  Before the conversation could be carried on anymore, the gates to the Time Locked Lands came into view.  Danny turned a grin to his new sister, who was staring upon the  large floating island and all of it’s towers.  “Ready to meet another princess?”

* * *

 

“What lunacy are you engaging in now?”  When George woke up and stretched, his brother was not there like he usually was.  After ten minutes of searching, he found the bespectacled teen in the attic surrounded by open books and his own notebook, a pencil in hand.  “Have you even had breakfast yet?”

“I have had food, yes.”  Rick snorted and set down his pencil.  He was still in his night pants so he obviously hadn’t cleaned up for the day.  “As to what lunacy, I say come over and look.”  Rick held up his notebook, and George walked over, lifting the book with his telekinesis to his hand.  “Show off.”

“And you aren’t?”  George chuckled as his brother huffed and went back to his books, and took a look at the notes.  There were symbols he’d never seen before, some that he had, and scribbled notes in Spanish and English alternatively.  “I’m barely passing with a C in Spanish so if you could translate?”

“That’s what I’ve been doing.”  Reaching over, he grabbed the notebook and flipped to a page mostly in English.  “I found one of our ancestor’s journals and it seems that our family has been involved in the supernatural much longer than we thought.”

“Did this ancestor find anything significant?”  Now George was interested and picked up a book, only to find it was in french.  “Or in English?”

“Yes, and no.  Apparently he married a witch named Cassandra Rava.”  Rick flipped through one of the books he had been facing the general direction of, George noticing that the pages moved a bit faster than they should have.  “And she taught him how to use his psychokinetic abilities and a little bit about her magic at the same time.  It looks like she was a follower of a sun god, and was able to introduce him to a lunar sp-”

“You’re distracting yourself from the issue with Danny, aren’t you?”  George hated to interrupt, really he did, but Rick hadn’t shown any signs of being out of denial about the part they played in Sadie’s death, and he was worried that his brother was going to put off coming up with a plan forever.  “We know who he is, but not because he told us, and we don’t know how to tell him that we know.  We need to figure that out.”

“Simple,” Rick spoke through gritted teeth, not wanting to approach this topic for a good long century.  “We figure out something worthwhile to offer in a deal and summon him to tell him.”

“Can we not try summoning him?  That’s what got us and him in this mess in the first place.”

Rick was silent for a moment, his shoulders tensed up like when he was being accused of something he knew he didn’t do, and George was afraid he’d have to deal with another impromptu wrestling match.  Instead, the bespectacled twin let out a slow breath and nodded.  “Yeah… not like we could help him by summoning him anyways.  Pass me that book?”

“You read too much and need physical activity,” George was not sure why, but it felt odd for him to be saying that to his brother.  “Get up, we’re going out today.”

* * *

 

With how quickly the gossip about Danny being the new prince spread, every spirit in Dora’s kingdom was watching them and murmuring excitedly, to the ghost boy’s utter embarrassment.  “Everyone knows about this, don’t they?”  Sure, Danny was ok with having a few fans in the human world, that meant that there were fewer people that were likely to shoot him from that side, but ghost fans?  “This is just as weird as when I first met the Far Frozen... “

“News of new royalty spreads rather quickly throughout a kingdom, my Prince.”  Fright was glaring enough to keep all of the other spirits from swarming the young halfa like moths to a flame.  “The people have heard of your heroics no doubt.”

“I helped save them from Aragon personally when he tried to kidnap Sam.”  Deciding to treat the next few feet like he did when he had to be close to human fans, Danny waved to everyone, a small smile on his face.

Elle rolled her eyes at how embarrassed he was and gave her brother a hard pat on the back to straighten him up.  “You gotta look confident Danny, yeesh they’re just fans.”  He turned to glare half-heartedly at her, but Elle was right.  “The cheesehead did give me a lesson or two beyond your life, one of those being that when everyone’s watching you gotta look confident or they’ll walk right over ya.”

Danny frowned a bit at that, not sure if he wanted to take any advice that came from Vlad.  Then again, that was going to be a part of his plan so he might as well get used to it now.  “You know it’s a little weird trying to look more confident than I feel when I spend most of my time in the human world doing the exact opposite.”

Fright was amazed that such loud people could have the ability to speak so softly among a large crowd of spirits - or hear each other for that matter, as he nearly couldn’t.  He was relieved when they were inside the castle, as he feared that the Prince’s timid disposition would make him seem weak to the people.  “The princess is right, your majesty.  If you do not let yourself appear to be one who should be in charge, the people will question the Spirit World’s choice in her new ruler.”

“Alright, yeesh, be more confident, I understand.  Now can we please just drop it and enjoy the visit?”  The other two nodded and Danny let out an exaggerated sigh.  “Thank you.  I like what she’s done with the place.”  Looking around Elle and Danny noticed that the castle’s stone was painted over - or  more likely the bricks somehow changed color - from purple to blue, there were bright banners all over and ghostly plants that didn’t lash out and try to kill them dotted the hall.  “It seems, and feels, happier.”

“Why thank you, Prince Phantom,” a familiar and halcyon voice rang out from in front of them.  The Fright Knight bowed to the princess, whose bright blonde hair was still perfectly braided into a long ponytail, “I am happy to see that my redecorating has had a positive effect.”  Dora blinked in surprise when  Danny and Elle followed the knight’s lead and laughed a bit.  “Oh, lord Phantom, there’s no need to bow to me.  You are the Prince of the entire Spirit World, you shouldn’t be bowing to anyone.”

The halfas rose with matching smiles.  “Dora, it’s so nice to see you again!  I almost can’t believe my eyes.”  Danny walked over and gave the princess a hug, much to the surprise of her ladies in waiting who had accompanied her to intercept the halfa prince.  “You’ve really come along since you dethroned your brother.”  He pulled back and held a hand out to Elle.  “Elle, this is my friend Princess Dorothea, Dora, this is my little sister Elle.”

Elle gave Danny a look that he couldn’t quite interpret before curtsying to the princess.  “It’s an honor to meet you, Princess, Danny has told me many good things about you.”

“I wish that I could say the same to you, young princess,” Dora returned the courtesy and turned her red eyes upon Danny.  “Lord Phantom, you never mentioned that you had a younger sister, and I don’t remember anything about one from when we met.”  Danny’s lips pressed into a thin line as he shook his head, signaling not to ask.  “But I am happy to see another princess.  I hardly get the chance, you know.”

“I can imagine you don’t, what with how things are only just starting to pick up.”  Elle chuckled and all four of them started walking again.

* * *

 

Vlad had not looked into ancient texts from the human world in fifteen years, but now it seemed that he should start from there.  The methods for summoning spirits to the human world started there after all.  Unfortunately, he wasn’t finding anything all that useful.  “Bah, this is taking far too long!  The only things I’ve found are warning against going through with the blasted ritual, nothing on how to stop it.”  Slamming the book he had just gone through closed, the irate mayor turned to his monitor and checked in on the Fenton household.  “At least Jack and Maddie haven’t been doing any attempts at a summoning for a while, I expected them to try it again the very next day.”

Jasmine was in her room, reading up on some psychology book as usual.  “Really, that girl could have such a bright future, though her idiot father will probably ruin any chances of acceptance in any colleges he accompanies her to.”  Most of the other rooms were empty - the Ops center, the living room, Daniel’s room, the other spare rooms that were in the large apartment building - but that was more alarming than seeing Jack and Maddie acting lovey-dovey.  Daniel was most likely with his friends - either on patrol or hanging out - nothing to worry about.  Looking to the lab, however, Vlad saw sigils being carved into the floor with a laser and muttered to himself in worry, looking through the books to check on the extra symbols.  “No, no no…”

* * *

 

“...candles are set.  Hopefully, this time, no interference shall prevent the success of the test.”  Maddie took out the needle once again and poised her finger over the outer circle this time.  “We shall be applying our blood to both the summoning circle and the binding symbols during this trial, as specified by newly found research to make the binding symbols worth anything.”

Jack pulled out his needle after lighting all the candles again and held his finger over the inner circle.  The two pricked their fingers at the same time.  When the blood hit the circles, the couple chanted excitedly, their hopes that this would work still high.  They would have that ghost boy this time.

* * *

 

Dora had observed that Danny’s outfit was not fitting for royalty in the presence of his subjects.  Elle agreed that he needed a costume change.  Fright felt that he could use something for official purposes.  Ganged up on, three against one, Danny relented and allowed himself to be pulled aside by the ladies in waiting, who displayed their ability to weave clothing out of thin air.

Walking out of the dressing room, the halfa spread his arms with an unsure smile.  “So uh, how do I look?”  It wasn’t that far off from what he normally wore; a black tunic with black pants and white gloves and boots, along with a silver belt and a white stripe that went down from his right shoulder to his left hip, crossing through the DP decal on his chest.  What he wasn’t all that sure about was the white hooded cloak that the ladies had put on his new outfit.

“I think it looks wonderful, Sir Phantom.”  Dora smiled and applauded his new look.  “Don’t you agree, dear Elle?”

“Yeah bro, it looks good on you but why the hood?”  Elle raised a brow at that, not sure how much it suited him.

“I asked for the hood personally,” The grinning prince grabbed it and pulled it over his head, surprising everyone when the cloak turned black.  “I refuse to wear a cape like that fruitloop, so it’s a cloak.”

“Considering that concealment and stealth are your strong points, my liege,” Fright commented with his hands crossed behind his back, standing at attention like he always had been when around Danny since this whole ‘prince’ thing started.  “I believe the cloak is fitting, especially with the enchantments apparently placed upon it by the ladies in waiting.”

Raising a brow, Danny grabbed the edge of the cloak and chuckled at the effect.  Pulling off the hood, he watched as white flowed from the head down to the edges.  “That’s pretty cool!  I wonder what Sam and Tu-”  A hard  _ pull _ on his core cut Danny off with a scream as sparks of energy crackled around his body.  “ _ Not again!  This summons… too strong! _ ”  Danny’s eyes flared up bright blue as did his aura, and he turned to his sister, his friend, and his knight, and reached out to them desperately.  “ _ The lab… HELP! _ ”  Alas, even in the Spirit World with the grip she kept on him; Danny was being wrenched inexorably away by the magic his parents invoked.

In a flash of light, he vanished.

* * *

 

Jack and Maddie both were anxious when they heard the struggling voice of the ghost boy.  “It appears that the subject known as Phantom is once again aware that we are the ones summoning it,” Maddie was glad for the microphones on their HAZMAT suits, as it freed her to walk over to the internal ghost shield projector’s activation switch on the far wall.

“However, this time, it appears to be working!”  Jack jumped in on the recording as the room dropped several degrees in temperature.  Near storm level winds blew from the air above the circle where a skeleton coated heavily in ectoplasm formed in the same spot that the winds were rushing from.  A pair of glowing eyes formed in the sockets and more ectoplasm that looked quite strangely like a cardiovascular, nervous and muscular system all dyed in green instead of red formed over the skeleton. Finally, a ring of light sparked into existence around the forming body, frost spreading from the center of the circle to the edges as the rings traveled up and down to reveal the ghost boy, a scream of agony clawing its way out of its throat.

“The test is successful!”  Maddie cheered jubilantly as the ghost fell to the ground panting.  “The ecto entity known as Danny Phantom, designated Phantom, has appeared in the summoning circle, though in a way different from reports of previous successful summons.”

Once he had caught breath he didn’t need, Danny raised his head in confusion and shot back into the air, zooming toward the portal.  Before he could make it past the circle, though, invisible chains wrapped around his wrists and ankles and pulled him back to the center.  “What?  What the-”

“The sigils researched have successfully bound the ghost to the circle!”  Jack laughed and gave Maddie a high five while the ghost boy looked down at the circle and noted a ring of odd symbols pulsating with red light.  “Strangely enough, the ghost’s appearance seems to be divergent from its usual guise.”  Danny ignored them as he tried to wrench free of his bonds, nightmares about being strapped down to a table by his parents rushing back to his mind.  Suddenly all that ecto weaponry, and lab equipment he was shown as a kid looked a thousand times more terrifying.


	16. The Lab

For all of two and a half seconds, there was utter silence. Then Elle grabbed Fright by his neck guard and yanked him down as she floated up closer. "What just happened to my brother?!" A protective and worried edge to her voice. Elle knew that Danny went through weird stuff - dangerous stuff even - every day, but he just screamed in pain, asked for help and vanished, and that was really bad.

"Princess, did lord Phantom not tell you about the summonings?" Fright stared down at the girl in confusion, mildly impressed by the bond the two must have shared. No one would dare to address him in such a way unless they were being driven by instinct greater than fear to do so. "The humans have learned how to summon the prince to them in order to make a deal with him."

"SUMMONED?" That was bad, that was really bad. Elle let go of the knight and raced for the exit. "He said 'the lab' and the only lab that he would be that scared about is his parents' lab! We have to go help him, now!"

Fright bowed his head to Dorothea, who looked extremely worried about the young halfa, and flew to catch up to the princess. "Princess, wait! Only fools rush in where angels dare not tread!" That got her to stop for the moment Fright needed to mount Nightmare and spur her into action. "Mount my Nightmare quickly and we shall go together!"

* * *

 

While Danny was trying to escape, his parents were judging his fashion sense. If this weren't the situation it was, he'd be pointing out that they have no room to talk. In this situation, however, he was just listening to every little word they said while freezing the ground. Unfortunately, it seemed that the symbols to block his energy.

"The subject is normally in a HAZMAT jumpsuit not dissimilar to ours, but…" Maddie walked around the circle inspecting the spook as it tried to get away again. "It seems that Phantom has adopted a more medieval royalty look. New attire includes a black tunic of unknown fabric, white gloves and boots as usual and a belt that appears to be an ectoplasmic rendering of silver, as well as a white hooded cloak." She quirked a brow after listing off the changes, noting one that she had missed. "And, it seems, the subject's eyes have shifted from their usual green to blue."

"Please," Danny finally pleaded to them, hoping he could appeal to their humanity just this once. "Please, let me go! I haven't done anything wrong to you, either of you, and I need to get back to my little sister!" Well, it wasn't a total lie, he did need to get back to Elle before she worried her head off.

"Sister?" Both scientists glanced to each other before locking eyes with the spook. "What are you talking about, ghost?" Danny couldn't see their eyes through the goggles at the moment, but he knew they were looking him in the eyes and some hope bloomed in his chest.

"My sister, I was with her when you summoned me, I need to go to her, she can't be by herself!" The urge to fly at the portal was all too great, but that would make it look like he was lying. "Something might find her, go after her and hurt her. I can't let that happen. Please." For a second, he saw the frowns on his parents faces and thought they were going to let him go.

Then the scientist pair looked at each other again and Maddie spoke with great intrigue. "The subject known as Phantom claims to have a sibling, female, in the ghost zone. This sister has never been observed with the subject, leading myself to believe that the subject is lying."

"Or maybe I don't want my little sister to be around dangerous ghosts and ghost hunters when I'm out saving the town?" Danny grit his teeth and pushed against the edges of the circle again, energy rushing to his limbs to try and break free of the chains. "What kind of brother brings his sister into a battle?"

"Hmm… It does make a valid point Mads." Jack gave Maddie that look that said he was interested in hearing what the spook had to say. If it was telling the truth they might be able to capture another specimen. However… "Ghosts don't reproduce, though, so I'm finding that a bit difficult to believe."

"You've been able to observe ghosts for all of a year now?" Danny rolled his eyes, scoffing at their arrogance. "You don't know everything about ghosts, most of us don't even know everything about our kind. I do however know that we can have families and kids." Floating above the symbols, but only as far as the bindings would allow him, he tried to concentrate on connecting with the energy chaining him down. If he could get control of it then he might be able to free himself. "And besides, what if my sister died with me, huh?" Just thinking of that made him cringe on the inside. "I failed to keep her safe once, I won't do it again.  Let,  _ me,  _ **_go!_ ** "

Both Fentons merely laughed at the implied threat as Jack pulled out his Fenton Weasel and aimed it at Phantom. "Never gonna happen, spook! Now, it's time to transfer you to an examination table!" The ghost started protesting, naturally, but that didn't deter the ghost hunter at all.

What did was the pounding against the ghost portal doors. Heavy blows dented the protective metal that made up the only barrier between them and the ghost zone. Then two black gauntlets pushed through, grabbing the edges of the doors. By the time Maddie had drawn her ecto pistol, and Jack his ecto bazooka, the Fright Knight, the infamous spirit of Halloween, had pried the doors open. "Prince Phantom! We are here to assist you!"

"Danny?" Elle shot past the knight and dodged the shots from the Fentons, returning fire only to knock the weapons from the hands of the hunters. When she spotted her brother, Elle flew into him and grabbed his arm, trying to pull him away. "Danny! What are you doing here? We have to get away before-" she stopped with a grunt when an ectoblast nearly shot her hand off.

"Foolish mortals, stay thy hands!" Fright was between the Fentons and the Phantoms in a near instant, his sword slicing through Jack's bazooka. "None shall harm the Prince whilst I am here!"

"Prince?" Maddie ducked a swing of the deadly ghost's blade and jumped back, firing off another few shots at the Fright Knight's face. "I thought that you ghosts already had a king?"

"That doesn't matter!" Elle was livid now, as she had realized that Danny couldn't exactly move outside of those weird drawings on the ground. " _ Let my brother go, now! _ " Her aura flared brighter than usual and flickered between it's normal white and a vivid green. Elle didn't want to hurt them, they were Danny's parents after all, but the charge that rose to her hands spoke loud and clear that she wasn't afraid to fight for her brother.

"Wait, Elle!" Danny jerked against the force of the binding sigils as it seemed to intensify. "The sigils! Get rid of the sigils and I can get away!"

"For seeking harm toward my Prince, thou shall both live the rest of thy days in thy worst nightmares!" Fright raised his sword, ready to strike and send the Fentons to the nightmare realm.

Elle blasted away a chunk of sigil-covered floor

The sword struck down

Then Danny's voice rang out and he froze in place, blade an inch from Jack's neck.

" **_FRIGHTKNIGHT!  YOU WILL NOT KILL THEM OR SEND THEM AWAY!_ ** " Danny got between his knight and his parents the second Elle had blasted away the sigil. The look in his eyes was some mix between protective and murderous instincts bursting to the surface. " _ They haven't hurt me, they just made a bunch of observations. Elle, get over here, we're leaving. _ " As his sister rushed to his side, Danny gave Jack and Maddie a look that neither of them understood, hurt and guilt, a promise unspoken, all within that one look. And then they were gone, in a flash of brilliant white light.

* * *

 

Vlad stared at the screen in his office, a book on sigils open in his lap, mouth agape in shock. Was that the Fright Knight? And that bothersome failed clone, Danielle? Most importantly of all, why had Fright called Daniel his Prince? "So the Fright Knight has betrayed me, eh?" Vlad masters took a fearful backseat as his ghost half overtook his thoughts once again, eyes flaring bright crimson. " _ Then it's time to see if a spirit of his kind can  _ **_die._ ** "

* * *

 

Tucker Foley was not one to brag too much - it'd draw too much attention to him and his friends if he did - but if he were, he'd be calling himself a genius right about now. He'd have to go out somewhere to test it where no one would see, but the techno geek was pretty sure he had this part of his invention down. Putting the thing in its case, which he had also made himself, Tucker headed to the door and opened it. He was not expecting the Pate twins. "Uh, can I help you?"

"We're looking for Danny," Rick answered first. "Is he here?"

"We need to talk to him." George sighed and put a hand on Rick's shoulder. The guy looked like he was about to push in to look himself.

"No, he's not here…" Tucker took a step forward, forcing the two freshmen to take a step back, and closed and locked his door. "I dunno where he is today. Give me the message and I'll pass it along."

George looked like he was about to say something, but then he caught his brother shaking his head out of the corner of his eyes. "Nah, we'll tell him when we see him." Rick sighed and turned around. "Later Tucker."

"When you see him, just tell him we want to talk ok?" George, at least, had the manners to wave as he caught up with his twin and they ran off to go find Danny.

Tucker stood there for a moment, thinking about all the possible reasons why those two would want to talk to Danny privately. Few were pleasant thoughts. Switching on his Fenton Phones, Tucker headed off to where he had planned to be. "Danny? You there man?"

* * *

 

In the moment, Danny was able to keep the fear from bubbling up in his voice, maybe make it seem like he had known how to get out of the bindings on his own. Now that it was over, though, his breathing was shallow and his pupils seemed to have contracted as well as turned green once again.

Thankfully, it was just Elle, Frightknight, and open Zone. Fright wasn't sure where they were, and though his Prince obviously needed a moment, they also needed to get to a secure spot before any hostiles attempted anything. "Lord Phantom, we are no longer in your parents' laboratory, but we are not out of the woods yet."

"Can't you see that he needs a moment?" Elle snapped at the knight before returning her attention to her brother. "Danny… listen to me, you are safe. They didn't hurt you, they didn't experiment, nothing bad really happened." Her voice was softer than usual, but she managed to put confidence behind her voice as well. "You are away from them, and you're safe." Elle hadn't expected to be pulled into a hug, but she went with it.

It took a moment, but Danny eventually got a hold of himself. His grip on Elle loosened some, but he still held on for a moment before murmuring a quiet thank you. Then he turned to his knight and went through the motions of survival in the Spirit World. "Where are we? Do you recognize anything here?" A quick glance around confirmed that Danny certainly did not.

"I do not know, my liege." Fright shook his head and pulled down the mouthpiece of his helmet. His skin was as black as obsidian, contrasting oddly with the pearl white of his teeth. Turning he put his fingers to his mouth and whistled sharply. "To me, Nightmare!" The call echoed throughout the seemingly empty space of the Spirit World. Once his mouthpiece was back on, the knight turned back to see that his prince's cloak was still black, the hood still hiding all but the glow of his eyes. "Nightmare shall come to us soon and then we may return to the human world wherever you wish us to."

"I don't plan to go back too soon…" Before Danny could follow up on that train of thought, his Fenton phone went off and Tucker's voice rang in his and Elle's ears. "One moment Fright. Tuck, I'm here, what's going on?"

" _ I just got a visit from the Pate twins on my way out. They wanna talk to you about something, but wouldn't say what. _ " Tucker sounded like he was picking something up physically. Probably the project he had mentioned earlier.

"Lovely," Danny grumbled and folded his arms. "First my parents summon me and now the Pates want to talk." This was turning out to be a very fun sunday for him it seemed.

" _ WHAT? _ " Tucker screeched into his Fenton phone so loudly that the Phantoms flinched. The sound of an ectoblaster going off and hitting something rang through the geek's microphone. " _ Your parents summoned you? Are you okay? Where are you right now?" _

"Tucker!" Elle spoke up before Danny could and let out an exasperated sigh. "It's great to know how concerned you are, but we're as fine as we can be after that." Elle didn't even want to think about how Danny was going to sleep tonight. "We're in open zone right now, waiting for Nightmare to come get us. We'll be fine, ok?"

"Tucker," Danny spoke up when he felt that his friend wasn't convinced. "we'll stay as safe as we can be, you know I wouldn't risk anything with Elle here."

" _ Yeah, that's true. _ " Tucker relented and sighed. " _ But when you get back we need to know what happened. Shall I fill in Sam on what's happened? _ " He didn't seem too keen on doing so if his tone was anything to go by.

"Why tell her what she already knows?" The grin on Danny's face was a welcome surprise for Elle. "I can hear her breathing right now, ghost hearing and all." If she paid close attention, the younger halfa did notice a strange sound in the background. "I'll catch you all up on the gruesome details later, but right now we have something to do."

Switching his Fenton phones to standby so that it would tell him if someone needed him, Danny returned his attention to his knight, who stood patiently waiting. "Fright knight, do you know of any way to block the power of a summoning? There must be some way, otherwise, people would have started doing this again way before I even became a half ghost." He wasn't trying to sound as desperate as he was, but since his parents knew how to get him where they wanted him… it wouldn't take them long to repair the floor, or just move the engraving laser.

"There should be a way, my lord." Fright nodded, sensing that Nightmare was drawing close. "However, the spirits that held such knowledge were some of the first that Pariah Dark had destroyed when the great war of spirits began." Seeing his prince's hope deflate was not something the knight wanted to see. It was a long shot, but he might as well give them all the information he had. "A Knowledge Seeker has not been seen since the fall of Pariah Dark, but I have been sealed away for most of that time. I am not fully aware as to whether or not one has popped up recently."

Elle rubbed Danny's back as he stared off into the distance in thought. The few times she got to see him over video chat and when she first met him, the older halfa never seemed to put as much thought into anything as he was now. "It's amazing what life or death stakes can do for mental stimulation. I'm surprised you never go to a library with that kinda thinking face."

Danny snapped up and a grin slowly formed on his face, aura brightening slightly. "I just made a connection." As he spoke, the sound of Nightmare's wings snapping against the space of the Spirit World met the trio of spirits' ears and the ghost boy's grin grew. "Perfect. Fright, I know where we need to go for the info we need."


	17. Brawl

Zooming through the air as a blur, on the lookout for any rogue ghosts, Valerie was enjoying the upgrades to her hoverboard and the speeds she could reach.  Flight was the best thing about being a ghost hunter, in her opinion.  Sure, stopping a ghost from hurting an innocent person and beating up the box ghost were fun, but flying in the air, even if aided by technology, was a freedom unlike any other.  It felt like she was free.  Free of poverty, free of struggling to keep everyone safe, free of the knowledge that her boss was an evil half ghost, free of the knowledge that she had been hunting an innocent teenager with the intent to kill him, free of her stupid job, free of social expectations; just free of everything.

It was also the best way to clear her head, and now that she had a day off from the Nasty Burger, Val was making use of her freedom in the air.  She had apologized to Phantom and let him yell at her, but what now?  She had started ghost hunting to get revenge on Phantom specifically, and now her main motivation for being the Red Huntress - as the internet seemed to have dubbed her - was gone.  While Val wasn’t going to stop protecting people from ghosts that needed a beat down, she now had to worry about any suspicion from Vlad.

That cheeseheaded, lying, manipulative little slimeball had her wrapped around his finger when she really thought about it.  He owned Axiom Labs, where her dad worked, which meant that he could have her father fired at any moment.  He knew her identity as the Red Huntress and could reveal that to the town, or even just to the GIW and then bam, her freedom would be gone thanks to their restrictions.  And her house wasn’t outfitted with anti-ghost tech like the Fentons, she had no defense against him.  Vlad could slip into her room or her father’s room in the middle of the night and kill them with no effort!  How could she keep him from knowing about her summoning and dealing with Phantom?  If he knew, he’d do any one of those assuming that he had no use for her anymore!

Usually going on patrol and flying around the town at all on her days off made it easier for Val to think, but with everything that was going on in her head, the usual remedy wasn’t working.  So, after checking for any ghostly activity on her scanners and finding none, the teen flew to an alleyway near her apartment building and willed her suit away.  Oddly enough, the young huntress met her father on his way out of the apartment.  “Dad?  I thought you had today off, like me?”

“Well, I did sweety, but I just got called in because of a huge shipment that we need to make sure stays safe.  I’ll have more men to work with on this assignment until we’re done, but I’ll also have to clock in more hours.”  Damon placed a quick kiss on his daughter’s cheek and waved to her as he walked down the stairs.  “I’ll see you when I get home!  Stay safe, Val!”

“Weird…” Valerie closed the door and sat on the couch, folding her legs as she thought.  “They haven’t really needed extra security for anything in awhile.  Hope nothing happens to ruin Dad’s position.”  It had taken a lot of hard work on her father’s part to get promoted from his bottom of the ladder job that he had been landed with when Phantom and that ghost dog - Cujo, the ghost boy had called it - wrecked the place.  Hopefully, they had upgraded their security measures to deal with ghosts.  “I wonder what it is… oh well.”  The teen shrugged her shoulders and picked up the remote, turning on the TV and vegging out like a regular girl her age for once in the longest time.  “As long as nothing happens to it, it’s not my problem.”

* * *

 

To the surprise of Elle and Fright, Danny had decided that he wanted to ride on Nightmare with Fright.  Elle still declined, but that was fine with him as long as she was able to keep up.  When they arrived at their destination, Elle stayed back and stared at the lion statues.  “Those aren’t gonna come to life and attack us, are they?”

“They didn’t when me and the other ghosts busted in and stopped the guy from ruining Christmas,”  Danny shrugged as he dismounted Nightmare and walked up the stairs of the library.  “So I’m assuming no.”

“I am amazed that you know of such a place, my prince.”  Fright inspected the building - carved to look as though it were made of books - with an impressed eye and tone.  “To find a Knowledge seeker when the last clan of them was wiped out is a great feat.”

“Well, I make a lot of people mad,” Danny chuckled and pulled off his hood, raising a hand to knock on the doors, which looked as though they hadn’t been opened in a year.  “I accidentally destroyed his Christmas poem when I was venting my anger about my parents, and he wrote me into his new Christmas poem.  I assumed that the Ghostwriter had to be a Knowledge Seeker, with his huge library and all.”  When no answer was received from the doors, which he expected with the writer in jail for violating the truce, Danny tugged on the handles and was surprised to find them locked.  “Huh… that’s odd, he didn’t have time to lock up when Walked took him to prison.”

Elle just stared at her brother for a moment while Fright mounted Nightmare.  “If the writer is imprisoned then his lair shant allow us entry.”  Now the knight was also giving the statues wary looks.  “Every lair has its own security measures, my lord.  Unless we wish to meet them, I believe we should leave.”

“To Walker’s prison, yes.”  Danny floated over after one last tug on the doors and got on Nightmare’s back behind the knight, finding that it wasn’t that bad riding her.  “We need that information and ony Ghostwriter can give it to us.”  The ghost boy’s voice held a bit more confidence now, but then he remembered Elle and stopped.  “...After we drop Elle off with Princess Dora.”

“What?!”  She cried out in shock and outrage.  Danny had been expecting that, though.  “You are not leaving me out of the fight.  If we have to bust a guy out of prison, we’re doing it together.  Who helped you fight off that giant ghost gorilla?  Me.”  Elle glared at the guilty looking halfa with crossed arms.  “I know how to handle myself in a fight, Danny, don’t you dare try and exclude me just because you have some major hero complex.”

“Hey, it is not a hero complex!”  No matter what Tucker, Sam, and Jazz said, he didn’t have a hero complex.  Danny didn’t like the thought of Elle in battle, even if he had needed her help in that fight with the gorilla.  However, he knew that she’d just follow after them the second they left, so there was hardly any use arguing.  “Fine,” he said with a reluctant sigh.  “You can come, but if a fight breaks out I want you to stick with Fright, ok?  You’re less likely to get hurt if you do.”

“You’re aware that I’m going to do whatever I please, correct?”  The ghost girl raised a challenging brow at her brother and knew right away that she had won this argument.  It was no surprise when Danny turned to Fright instead.

“If a fight breaks loose, I want you making sure that she’s safe, not me.  Understand?”  Once the knight gave an affirmative, they were off towards Walker’s prison, and as they left, the sound of twin roars cut through the usual silence of the Spirit World.  No one looked back.

* * *

 

When Sam headed home from her martial arts practice, she glared at the twins, who were also headed toward her door.  Waiting until they were about to knock, the goth cleared her throat and reveled in the jumps that it earned her.  “Hi, I assume you wanted to talk to me?”

“Yeah, actually, we were hoping you could tell us where your friend Danny is.”  George glared a moment before taking note of the older teen’s Gi.  “I see you’re into martial arts.  I can’t see you going with the typical kung-fu so I’m guessing… Tae-Kwon-Do?”

“You are correct,” Sam nodded, mildly impressed that the technogeek was able to guess what she was learning.  “But Danny isn’t here and I don’t know where he is.  Probably somewhere practicing his guitar.”  Every good lie had a bit of truth in it after all, and Sam had gotten pretty good at lying.

Even so, the twins didn’t seem convinced that she didn’t know where Danny was though they also looked disappointed.  “Well, if you see him, could you tell him that we need to talk to him?  Also, would you like to spar at any point?”  Rick ignored his brother elbowing him in the side with a grin.  His next boxing match wasn’t for a while and it was always good to practice with new opponents.

“I hope you’re not assuming I’ll be easy to take down,” the goth’s tone was one of warning, a warning the bespectacled twin seemed to pick up on.  “If so, you’ll be sorely mistaken.”

“Why would I challenge someone if I thought it would be easy to beat them?”  Both boys looked utterly confused by the thought.  “I propose a challenge because I want a challenge.  An experienced ghost hunter who can take on an undead ax-wielding executioner and live to tell the tale is someone I want to fight!  Even if I get my ass kicked!”

Sam grinned at the excitement she saw in the younger boy and nodded.  “Alright… gimme a minute and I’ll be ready for a good sparring match on the grass.”

“I’ll be stretching.”

“Do you have popcorn, by any chance?  It’s not often I get to see him get his ass handed to him.”  George smirked when Rick shoved him and raised a brow at the environment lover.

* * *

 

The plan had been simple: go in, use Danny’s authority as the prince to get the Ghostwriter out of Walker’s prison, get out and get the info they needed.  Simplicity itself.  Simple doesn’t mean easy, however, and so Danny found himself covering his new outfit with ice armor to keep free of the cuffs fired from the guards’ batons.  His aura had shifted to blue again, along with his eyes, and Elle’s aura was flickering between white and green again.  Speaking of whom, Elle was launching volleys of ectoblast at the guards trying to gang up on her brother, while the FrightKnight was cutting through them one by one with skill that had some of them fleeing outright.

Danny slammed his fist into the white-suited warden’s gut and sending him flying into a wall.  “Sorry Walky, but we need someone in here, and you refused to listen to reason.  Now then,” he knelt down to Walker’s level and glared at him directly in the blank green eyes.  “ _Where is the Ghostwriter?_ ”

“And why should I tell you, punk,” Walker reached up and grabbed at Danny’s neck, only to have his hand grasped in a crushing grip and forced down.  “When you still owe me five thousand years in this here prison.  Unless you want to join him in his cell, you ain’t findin out where it is!”

Taking a deep breath, Danny decided to try something he had been meaning to ask Fright about.  “ _Walker, I am the rightful ruler of this world, as won in trial by combat, and I command you to-_ ”

“You can’t command me to do nothin, punk!”  Walker glared up at the half ghost and tried to punch him off, only succeeding in getting him to jump off.  “If that’s the way you became the heir to the throne then I challenge you for the right to the crown!”  The entire prison went quiet, and everyone stopped fighting.  Walker’s white aura brightened slightly, and Danny stood tall in answer to the challenge.  “And if you win, I’ll even take off the time you owe me.”

“ _And you will give us the Ghostwriter, with a full pardon on his crimes as well._ ”  Walker’s lackies all looked shocked at the declaration, not understanding why the teen would want to pardon the book ghost for his attacks on the boy’s town during the holidays and blaming it all on him.  Walker simply growled inhumanly and headed for a more spacious area for their fight.  “ _This goes without saying but, Challenge Accepted._ ”

Considering the drawbacks of a cloak in battle, Danny concentrated on his old look and was pleasantly surprised to see his transformation rings wash over him and replace his royal outfit for his HAZMAT.  A surprised and minorly concerned Elle followed the two fighters next to Fright, who glared at all of the guards, not expecting them to show any honor during the match.

When they arrived in the prison’s courtyard Danny stopped closer to the door and Walker kept going for about ten feet between turning around and grinning at the prince.  “I’ll enjoy beatin you down, ghost boy.”  With the challenge accepted, the two combatants flew toward each other.

Danny ducked under Walker’s starting right hook and landed a jab to his gut, followed by two more to the chest before backing away from the black-gloved fist that grazed his head and had him staggering back a bit.  The warden lunged and swung at the boy, aiming for his head and chest mostly and he grew frustrated that only one out of three attacks were hitting.  After the Phantom’s dodge, Walker fired a beam of energy from his eyes and hit him square in the chest, and backhanded the teen hard enough to have him spitting out a glob of ectoplasm.

Danny growled himself and leaped over the warden, kicking him in the back of the head and coating his hands and arms in ice.  Jabbing at the older ghost’s knees, he covered his boots up to his own kneecaps and brought the taller down to slam his fist into the skeletal spirit’s jaw, though not before getting blasted back by a ghost ray.  This was answered with a ghost ray of his own, stronger than what Walker had tried.  To the warden’s surprise, he was blasted back into a wall, and before he could recover he took another blow to the jaw before ice encased his body.

Danny charged up a blast in his palm that grew brighter and brighter as Walker’s attempts to break through the ice proved futile and let his hand hover dead center over the warden’s chest: right over his core.  With eyes as cold as the ice he made, and a threatening voice of power, he asked, “ _Do you yield?_ ”

Walker stared at the boy before bowing his head in shame.  This kid was serious, he could tell that in his eyes.  Whatever was necessary in order to get whatever it was he needed from the Ghostwriter, the boy would do it.  In a barely audible grumble, the warden said, “I yield.  You win.”

Danny absorbed the energy from the charging blast and melted his ice, helping Walker up.  “ _You fought well._ ”  The coldness left the halfa’s eyes and Walker stared in bewilderment before grudgingly saying the same of him.  Danny’s outfit changed once again, and he raised a brow at the warden.  “ _The Ghostwriter?_ ”

“I’ll show you to his cell.”  Walker nodded and Danny waved over at Elle and Fright to follow after them as the taller ghost headed toward a corridor.  Every guard was silent as they passed, but the prisoners were all cheering from their cells.  No one could believe that the ghost boy was able to fight Walker and win.

“Danny, that was great!”  Elle grinned when she got next to him, glad to see that he grinned back.  “I’ve never seen you fight like that!  Where did you learn to fight like that?”

“My friends are all eager to teach me something whenever I visit,” Danny shrugged, heat rising to his cheeks.  “I just put it all together and practice with Sam and Tuck.  Mostly Sam, of course, Tuck prefers an ecto blaster and computer screen over hand to hand combat.”

“Yeah, I got that from the whole technogeek thing.”  The ghost girl took a moment to look around at the prison as they passed and shuddered.  “How anyone can put others through this kind of thing, I don’t understand.”

“I capture the souls of the worst criminals of the human world once they cross over, as well as any ghosts who violate the rules.”  Walker sounded rather proud of himself for that though the siblings couldn’t be sure he was telling the truth.  “The worst of the worst from humanity seem to form as ghosts close by, almost like the Zone herself is tellin me to lock em up.”

“Right now, our focus is on the Ghostwriter,” Danny said through gritted teeth, aura flaring a bit brighter now.  “After we have what we need, we’ll worry about how many innocent spirits you have locked up here, Walker.”  The warden was silent after that for the next ten minutes until they finally came upon a cell like every other.

The difference being the gray skinned spirit within the cell, even after a year in this ghostly prison, he still had on his scarf and coat, unlike every other prisoner.  Green eyes glanced up over the rims of dull violet glasses and shark-like teeth were shown in a smile that was both charming and minorly disturbing.  “Ah, young Danny Phantom, what a pleasure it is to see you again.”


	18. be Prepared!

The writer rose from his levitating lotus position and stood on the air half a foot from the ground.  “And I see you brought with you the infamous FrightKnight, feared black clad spirit of the hallows eve festivals, and … who might you be?”  He turned a less baneful gaze to Elle, though he didn’t seem all that upset with any of them except perhaps Walker.

“I’m Elle,” she answered with a wave, ignoring the awkwardness of the conversation.  “Danny’s little sister.”  The snort that Walker gave had both Phantoms glaring in his direction, though the elder halfa’s warning gaze was what froze the warden's words.

“Oh?”  Ghostwriter’s eyes widened the tiniest bit in surprise.  He didn’t remember Phantom having another sibling beyond Jasmine.  “Interesting… well, little one, I’m sure that your brother has told you all about me.”

Elle shrugged, almost forgetting the warden and the fact that they were in a prison at all with how casual the writer was acting.  “Just that you used your powers to write him into a poem after he got all grinchy.”  The trapped spirit merely chuckled at that, drifting a bit closer to the bars.

“Well, there’s more to the story than that, but I suppose it’s an expected summary.”  Pleasantries apparently out of the way, Ghostwriter turned his attention to Danny.  “So, to what do I owe the surprise?  I assume it has something to do with your change of wardrobe.”  

“I... “ Danny glanced over at Elle and thought about people attempting to figure out how to summon the new ghost girl who appeared next to Phantom.  “We, need your help.  And, you are free to go.”  Gesturing to Walker, Danny waited for the warden ghost to begrudgingly uphold his end of the bargain and unlock the cell, freeing the book loving spirit.  

“I see, finally figured out some of what defeating Pariah Dark on your own did for you, eh?”  Ghostwriter walked out of his cell with a grin and stretched.  “I must say, thank you young Phantom.  Though I wonder,” he raised a brow at the halfa as he righted himself and they started walking again, this time heading for the exit.  “Seeing as to how I could easily give you whatever information you seek from the confines of this prison, why free me?  I hate to sound ungrateful, but I’m a naturally curious person.”

Danny nodded, understanding entirely.  He didn’t come off as having the best of character during their first meeting, what with his scroogeness and refusal to learn a valuable lesson.  “No, I understand.  It’s because while you put a lot of people in danger, you didn’t do in a way that would kill anyone.  You knew that I’d beat all the toys and the trees that the reindeer wouldn’t actually hurt anyone.”  A sheepish grin crept upon his face.  “You just wanted to teach me a lesson about not being a grinch, so you didn’t do  _ too _ much wrong.”

“You also knew that it’d be rather impossible to force me to give you any information before you fully became king.”  When Danny offered no comment, the reality bending spirit grinned once again and nodded.  “That’s a rather smart move on your part, little prince.”

“Who’s gonna try and command a guy who can rewrite reality?”  Elle found that Danny had a good point, and Fright decided he should probably find out more about this spirit in case he thought to take down the prince at any time.  “I’m guessing that’s why Walker didn’t try to take your usual clothes and stick you in one of those stereotypical prison outfits?”

“That’s another thing I was just thinking!”  Elle floated up to Danny’s eye level as she butted in, floating almost in front of him.  “I thought they wore denim in prison, I remember it from the last one I flew through to escape a ghost.  What’s with the black and white stripes?”

“That would be a modern prison, little Phantom,” the writer chuckled at the low growl that rumbled in Walker’s throat at the negative comments about his precious prison,  Turning his attention back to Danny, the pitch haired spirit tilted his head in question.  “So… what information do you need from me?”

“Not here… even if you discount Walker, there’s too many of my enemies that could be in here, and if someone decides to stage another prison break like mine, I wouldn’t want any violent sociopath coming after me in any way.”  Ghostwriter respected that logical thinking and nodded in understanding.

Once they were outside the prison, the released spirit stretched once again and grinned wider than before.  “Ah, freedom.  Glad it came before I had to break out, or worse, Randy came looking for me.”  Looking to the Phantoms and their knight, the writer raised a questioning brow.  “I assume you wish to speak at the library instead of the grounds near Walker?”

“Of course.  I can’t be sure whether or not Walker was telling the truth about the criminal souls who might form as ghosts in the area, and I’d rather not fight another sociopathic killer today.”  The quartet of spirits began to fly toward the library, when there was a flash of violet light and they were in front of the library doors.  Ghostwriter was fine with it, of course, and set down on the steps, while Danny stared at the writer.  “That… shouldn’t have been so surprising, with everything you’ve done.”

“Of course not.  Also, he was telling the truth.  In the few years that I spent checking, I noticed that all the worst criminals of the human world end up over there.”  The doors swung right open before he even got halfway to them, and a smile made it’s way to his face.  “Come in, come in.  Even if you did get me landed in jail, at the very least you got me out, so I suppose I can be courteous.”

The first times that Danny had been there, he never really looked around to take in the sight of the library, and boy was it a sight.  There were rows upon rows of bookshelves that towered over them, some a normal size and others reaching up to the domed ceiling.  Every now and then, the books would float out of place and fly off to a new one, for some reason unbeknownst to the three visitors.  There was an odd humming that reverberated in the background that Danny hadn’t noticed before, but he assumed it was simply a ghostly lair thing, as no one felt the need to clue him in.  “This place is… amazing!”

“Yeah…” Elle nodded in agreement, rising up to one of the shelves to look through the books.  “Some of these don’t look like they’re even in english.”

“That would be because several of them are not,” the writer called out as he flew deeper into his lair.  His voice echoed around the building, though, and Danny was eerily reminded of his first encounter with the spirit.  “Find a place to sit down and I’ll bring everyone some tea.  I just need to check up on a few things.  I’ll be right with you.”

With that in mind, the three spirits walked further into the library, looking for a place to sit down.  Danny found a couch fairly quickly and they all sat down, after a bit of persistence from Danny and Elle that Fright also sit down with them.  “We aren’t like the old kings and queens from back in the day, Fright.  You can sit with us.”

“My apologies, my lord.”  The knight bowed his head for a moment.  “I am simply not accustomed to these … modern ways.”

“One can’t expect a three thousand or so years old spirit to suddenly become accustomed with the ways of the modern world in mere months,” The Ghostwriter appeared once again, and set down three cups of tea and one of coffee.  “Sugar, anyone?”  Elle raised her hand, and they all waited for the pot to vanish before getting down to business.  “So, what is it that you need of me, young Phantom?”

Glad to finally get to the point, Danny explained what happened since the Pate twins figured out how to summon him.  After his brief summary of what happened, he took a sip of his tea, glad that the writer didn’t stop him to ask anything through the whole explanation.  “And so, I thought that if anyone had this kind of info, it’d be you.”  Or Clockwork, of course, but they had made it clear that they booked no interference unless it was absolutely necessary, so he couldn’t go to them about this.  “Can you help us?”  Danny’s eyes rarely showed what he truly felt anymore, but now he gave the elder spirit a clearly pleading look.

After a few moments of thought, the Ghostwriter let out a sigh and set his tea down.  “Out of all the spirits to become the heir, you are the best candidate from what I know of the others.  I can’t have you being killed by your fool parents, now can I?”  Rising to his feet, the writer teleported to the center of the library and held out his hands.  Violet light pulsated through the area that the other three were in, and several books flew toward the spirit.  Each book opened itself, and flipped through several pages, and went back to its shelf after being deemed the wrong tome.  It took several minutes, those of which involved anxious silence and hoping that the next book would be the right one.  Danny’s face fell a bit more each time a book floated back and he was almost sure that what they needed wasn’t there when all but one book was sent back.  “This should be it, and if not then I’ll need to go down to the archives.”  

When the writer appeared next to Elle once again, he was holding a book with a gold and silver cover, blanketed in a thin yet pure white aura.  “You need to be able to block your parents from being able to summon you whenever they wish, correct?”  At the boy’s nod, Ghostwriter flipped through, eyes scanning the pages so quickly his irises seemed to disappear.  When he stopped, he read over the page just as quickly, and started walking.  “Follow me,  please.  It says here that in order for a spirit who does not yet have the strength of will to deny a summons from a specific human, then precautions can be taken to prevent this human from being able to call upon the spirit,” he paused in his steps and sighed.  “But things must be gathered for the ritual, and I’m hardly a botanist, I don’t have these things.”

“What does botany have to do with this?”  Elle raised a brow, feeling particularly interested here.

“Ritualistic magics, like this one, require preparation and reagents.”  Ghostwriter felt both minorly annoyed that no one understood such basic mystical knowledge, and intrigued by the young girl’s interest.  “Of this list, I only have the viola in my garden.  These are mostly plants found in the Spirit World.  The only one that you’ll find in the human world would be the marigold.”

“Can I see that list of reagents?”  When handed the book, Elle looked over it all and nodded with a grin.  “Danny’s not the only one with friends in the Spirit World.  Mura leaves and Ujensa flowers.  I know where to find that.”

“What?”  Danny was looking at her as though she had grown two heads for a moment before recomposing himself.  “When did you ever come into the Spirit World?”

“I should tell you about my adventures sometime, shouldn’t I?”  Elle grinned and read over the list again.  “Another thing he’ll need to get from the human world is some representation of them.”

“And with his access to, say a brush they might use, that shouldn’t be too hard to acquire.”  Ghostwriter nodded and took back the book.  “If you will go get those and meet me back here, I would be happy to help you.”

As Elle toward the doors of the library, Danny raised a brow at the Ghostwriter, confused.  “I’m unbelievably grateful, don’t get me wrong, but you’re being awfully forgiving and helpful towards someone who got you locked up in jail.  I have to wonder why.”

“As any intelligent ruler should,” the writer grinned and closed the book.  “I am forgiving you because Walker was hardly able to do much to harm me, the same for the prisoners and other guards.  It gave me a chance to get the stories of the other spirits and ghosts trapped within before leaving.  The only truly horrid parts of being there were being away from Vydia, being unable to write down those stories and oranges.”

“Those first two sound like pretty big bad points…”  Danny still felt pretty bad about all of this, but something about that answer confused him.  “Vydia?”

“The library,” Ghostwriter said simply, as though he expected Danny to understand why the building was named.  When it was made clear through the boy’s expression that he did not, the spirit turned to raise a brow at Fright.  “You didn’t teach him about lairs?”

“I was waiting for him to have one before telling him, knowledge seeker.”  The knight stiffened up, clenching a hand behind his back in annoyance.  “Teaching such a lesson beforehand seemed pointless.”

“Always good to have some basis of knowledge about what your existence is going to consist of, wouldn’t you agree?”  Seeing the blank green eyes narrow, the writer felt that he had won that debate and returned his attention to Danny.  “As you know, every spirit and ghost in the Spirit World resides in their own lair.  What you apparently don’t know, is that these lairs are sentient, and have their own form of communication with their owners as well as defences.”

Danny nodded and placed a hand on his chin, looking up in thought.  “That would explain all the ways Skulker’s island tried to attack me and Val when we were trapped there by him.”  Seeing the older spirit was ready to launch into a full on lesson, he held up a hand with a sigh.  “Before I learn more, this is important, so I need to go and get that marigold and hair.”  A small smile appeared on his face as he floated backwards towards the door.  “You should be a teacher, I bet you’d be more interesting than any of mine in school.”

* * *

 

When Sam walked back out of her home, she handed George a bowl of popcorn and lead them to the back with a grin.  “So, how long have you been boxing?”

“About two years,” Rick shrugged with a grin of his own, having taken the few minutes that Sam had needed to stretch.  “I win about five out of every seven matches I’ve been in so far.  I hope to become a professional.”

“Cool, that’s a nice win lose ratio.  Just remember…”

“There’s always someone better than you, I know,” The bespectacled twin nodded and took off his glasses.  “Dad reminds me when I start getting cocky.  This is a pretty swanky place ya got here.”

Sam shrugged, never having cared much about her grandmother’s obscene wealth.  She merely wished her parents didn’t use that as an excuse for not working a damn day in their lives.  “One of my ancestors invented the deli toothpick cellophane-twirler device, and my grandmother is currently in control of the family fortune for the most part.”

“Helps with protests, I’m assuming?”  George raised a brow when Sam looked back at him and nodded.  “I noticed that whenever you’re not fighting ghosts, you’re a pretty activistic person.”

“Thanks,” once they reached a clearing of grass circled by white chalk, she stopped at the far edge and turned around.  “I just really care about the environment and wish more people did as well.”

“It’s rather unfortunate, the effect humanity has had on the planet,” Rick agreed and George nodded as he accepted his brother’s glasses and stepped out of the arena.  “I might come to a protest some time.  For now, though, how bout we see who kicks who’s butt?”  Fists raised, he got into his usual fighting stance and grinned when he saw her do the same.

“I take it you can see well enough without your glasses?”  Sam took her own stance, feet spread and hands raised, and popped the joints in her neck.

“Yup, near sighted.  I can see an opponent easy, but anything around… seven, ten feet away, is too far for me to see clearly.”

“Meanwhile, I’ve got near perfect vision, so this’ll be a hit based match.  Blocked hits do not count for points, whoever lands twenty solid hits is the winner, and if you back out of the ring, you lose.  Sound reasonable?”  Both combatants nodded and George raised his hand.  “Ready… start!”  He swung his arm down and Rick lunged forward, going for a straight jab at Sam’s chin.  She blocked his jab and aimed a jackknife strike at his arm, which he dodged as he backed up, staring at her as she did him.

After another moment of sizing each other up, Sam dashed forward and feinting a swing kick at his leg, following up with a jab to his chest.  “Point, Manson.”  The goth ducked a left hook and grunted when she was hit with a knee to the gut.  “Point, Pate.”  Grinning, she ducked and avoided most of his jabs and hooks after that, but found that he was just as good at dodging.  

For several moments, the two appeared even.  At one point, however, Rick frowned and backed out of the exchange of blows and blocks.  “You’re going easy on me.”

“What makes you think that?”  Sam tilted her head, not showing any signs of being out of breath at all.  She had been in a more defensive stance the whole fight, George finally noticed.

“Your stance isn’t for offense at all anymore, just evading and blocking, and you’ve got real fighting experience where I just have in the ring experience,”  He glared at her as though she was mocking him with the question.  “It shouldn’t be  _ this _ even.”

“Glad you’ve got great analytical skills, Rick,” Sam complimented and rolled her neck.  “Do you want me to go all out?”

“I don’t want you to treat me like some homicidal spirit bent on world domination, no.”

“Rick Pate, world class sass master!”

“But I do want you to actually fight me,” Rick continued, ignoring his brother’s comment and the fact that a chunk of popcorn was gone.  Getting back into his stance, he glared at the goth.  “I can take a fight.”

“Alright,” shifting into a more offensive stance, Sam grinned and took a few steps forward.  “Hope you didn’t show me the fullest scope of what you can do just now.”  And then her foot connected with his jaw.

* * *

 

It had taken her a little while to find her way from the Ghostwriter’s library, but Elle soon touched down on vivid green grass of an island in the Spirit World so large it might as well be a continent.  Before her stood trees that varied in height between what one would see planted on a sidewalk to the majority that reached up to rival skyscrapers.  Many of them had flowers or fruit on them, but some were simply covered in leaves of varying shades of green.  Flying up to one of the branches, she cupped her hands over her mouth and called out.  “Mokuto!  I call upon the Guardian of the Forest!  Mokuto, are you there?”

After a few moments of silence, the wood of the branch she was standing on stretched up slowly and melded itself into a humanoid form, tall and lanky with skin like mahogany bark and eyes and hair the same color as the forest.  Reaching out, the spirit pulled the ghost girl into a tight hug.  “Elle!  Ancients above, I missed you!”  The two laughed and Elle returned the hug before she was let go.  “What’ve you been up to, my friend?  It’s been far too long!”

“I’m sorry, Mokuto, but finding natural portals in and out of the Spirit World isn’t easy and I don’t quite know how to make them myself.”  Elle looked the spirit over and smiled, glad to see her friend again.  “I am glad to see you again as well.  I searched all over Brazil, hoping to find a portal back.”

“Yes well, I do hope you were safe when you searched,” he raised a brow, and the halfa sighed softly and nodded.  “Good.  So, I have a feeling you need help with something.  That’s how you found this forest in the first place.”  He leaped to another branch and grinned at her in challenge.

Elle met his grin and his jump.  “Unfortunately so.  I promise, I will find time to come here for fun reasons, Mokuto.”  The two of them began to jump around from branch to branch, staying within earshot of each other.  “My brother is in danger, and the ritual we need to perform in order to protect him requires Mura leaves and the oil of the Ujensa flower.”

“I see,”  Mokuto nodded and leaped up.  Elle followed, perfectly fine with his ‘no flying’ rule, and bounced off of tree trunks to keep up.  When she finally reached the branch that the forest spirit had gone too, he was holding some sky blue colored leaves.  “Mura leaves.  How many do you need?”

“This should be plenty for what we need to do, thank you.”  Realizing that her bag wasn’t with her, just like last time she came to the Forest.  So, she went with a lesson that Mokuto had taught her, and concentrated on her hands.  Green light shone between them and formed itself in the shape of her bag before the actual object appeared.  “Whew, that still takes a lot out of me, even in the forest.”

“I doubt that you’ve had to use that skill very often, if it takes so much energy,” the older spirit observed, weaving a small pouch from the branch they stood on and placing the leaves in it and grabbing a handful more.  “Never hurts to have just a little extra.  And the Ujensa flowers aren’t too far from here.”  The two dashed off again, waving to other forest spirits that they passed on the way.

Eventually, Elle brought up something that had been bothering her ever since she found out that Danny had gotten training from Frostbite.  “Mokuto, may I ask something of you?”

“Of course, little one,” Mokuto slowed down a bit to get closer to the ghost girl and nodded.  “What is it?”

“My brother is over protective, and believes that I need to stay out of all the battles that he’s going to go into,” kicking off a branch a bit harder than she had intended to, Elle took a breath to relieve some anger.  “I think it’s because of my inexperience with fighting against other spirits and using my powers in combat.  He’s received training from several other spirits, and you helped me learn how to use quite a few of my own abilities so,” stopping on a lower branch, having noticed that Mokuto had been leading them downward, she looked up to her friend before bowing her head.  “Great Mokuto, Guardian of the Forest, will you train me in the ways of the spirit world?”

The elder spirit looked down at the girl in thought, his face a mask that could have blended in with the rest of the trees if one looked away for but a moment.  Few would come to him for such a request, after all.  Those who did, mostly didn’t do well in learning the ways of the forest; mostly they only learned how to heal from him.

Elle, however, seemed as though she could be a different story.  The forest invited her in so quickly, and she had yet to get lost.  Even following him, a good deal of spirits and ghosts that wandered into the forest would get horribly lost in a matter of moments, and find themselves leaving without meaning too.  Elle, on the other hand, had been following him as though she lived in the forest all her life.  Even now, as he looked at her, Mokuto could feel as well as see the energies of the forest flowing over and through the young spirit as though she was one of Her children.

Elle was nearly sure that Mokuto would say no, and would have retracted her request had he taken any longer in saying, “I accept your request, little one.  I will gladly teach you the ways of the Spirit World as I know them, and I shall help you to learn more self defense.”  Looking up, the halfa saw a broad grin on the spirit’s face, and returned it as he ruffled her hair.

“Thank you, Mokuto!  I promise, I won’t disappoint you!”  Elle jumped up and hugged her friend and now teacher for a moment before settling down once again on the tree.

“I never suspected that you would.  Now, let us find that Ujensa, hm?”  Mokuto took off again, and Elle followed suit with a grin.  Danny would see, she was fully capable of fighting alongside him.

* * *

 

Danny was glad that he didn’t have to tell the Frightknight twice that he didn’t want the older spirit following him into his room.  Danny may have been practicing concealing his power from even the ectoplasmic sensors in the house, but Fright hadn’t and the teen didn’t need alarms going off as soon as he entered his room.  Grabbing the hairs was easy, his parents were still in the lab, going over their notes no doubt.  What made everything annoyingly difficult was the unexpected pull of another summons.  In a flash of light, Danny was in a familiar room, and seeing the person who summoned him had the ghost boy rolling his eyes.  “Hello again…”


	19. Time is of the Essence

Sam almost felt bad, she had been holding back so much for a reason. Now, she wasn't sure if Rick was unconscious or just didn't want to get up. "You ok?"

After a moment, Rick let out a groan and nodded, shaking his head at the offered hand. Far too tired to give a verbal response. Upon later reflection, he wouldn't call a black eye, several bruises and too exhausted to move his sweat covered limbs 'ok'

"Alright, wait here and I'll be back with a bottle of water." Sam ran into her house and straight into the kitchen, mildly regretting how badly Rick had taken her hits. When she finally got back to the yard, George had taken his brother's shirt off to help him breathe a bit easier, though he was still panting heavily. "Here, if anything can get through our filters then it's microscopic."

"You seem to have almost killed my brother," George chuckled before noting the less than amused look on Sam's face. "Not seriously, he'll be fine. Though, I can't say I've ever seen him lose this badly."

"I'm impressed, honestly," Sam complimented as George rose to his feet and began to flail a bit. "He's pretty skilled."

"Impressed? He lasted three minutes!" George loved his brother, truly, but there was a limit to how far he would ignore how much better someone else was and call a loss a bit of bad luck. "I've never seen a regular person move that fast. How did you get this way?"

"When you're in the ghost hunting business, you either learn to move fast or you become what you're hunting," was the very serious answer given before Sam stretched a bit and headed towards her house. "It was nice fighting you guys, but I have some things planned for today. Have a nice day, boys and put some ice on all of that if it doesn't clear up soon."

* * *

 

Of all the people to have summoned him, Dash was not who Danny had been expecting. The jock had only barely been laying off anyone else in school when Danny had been paying attention, so he guessed Kwan spoke to him. " _ What a surprise, Dash, I hadn't expected another call from you so soon. _ " His voice echoed disturbingly with dark undertones that didn't match him at all, an irritating accessory to being summoned.

"Phantom! Hi, uh, I just wanted to talk, y'know?" Dash did sound a little off, but Danny wasn't sure if he was frightened or bothered by something else.

"I'd love to talk to you, Dash, but I've got something I really need to get done," Danny spoke without a twinge of guilt. This was Dash, and he didn't have any proof the bully was trying to change yet. "Maybe another time?"

"No, please! I uh, I made hashbrown casserole as an offering, if you want it." Dash wasn't sure why a ghost would want to eat, being dead and all, but the hero had liked his cooking the last time so he thought it would make a good offering.

Tempting, but Danny didn't agree right away. "What exactly do you want Dash? I'm on the clock and the longer I stay the more people are going to be in danger." Which wasn't exactly a total lie, since he didn't want to put himself or Elle or anyone they rescued in any danger, and if he couldn't figure out how to block his parents' attempts at summoning him, he'd be getting yanked away during ghost fights and rescues.

"Uh, well, my buddy Kwan said that he had a talk with you, and I wanted to just check and see if he was tellin the truth, ya know?"  _ Well, that explained why Dash seemed so uncomfortable, _ Danny thought,  _ he's questioning his connection to his hero. _ "Are you really upset with me?"

_ An explanation shouldn't take too long _ , Danny thought as he extended a glowing blue hand. "Enough time for me to explain in exchange for that hash brown casserole." Dash shook on it and stared at the snow that covered his arm this time instead of ignoring it, as though it were a sign of Phantom's discontent. The halfa grabbed the casserole and stepped outside of the circle. "Yes, Dash, I am upset with you," the blond's braced but hopeful expression fell a bit. "You're a bully, you abuse other kids physically and emotionally for your own sadistic enjoyment without even the thin excuse of avenging a wrong.. Do you really think that's the kind of behavior a hero would be ok with?"

Dash shrunk under the scolding tone and scratched the back of his neck, looking away. "Well, I… I wouldn't say abuse…" He tried face-saving, but as Phantom's eyes brightened, Dash shut his mouth.

"Beating up the other students, forcing their bodies to conform to unnatural shapes to fit in a small locker and locking them inside, half drowning them in toilet water, and picking at everything they like to make them feel bad for liking it. These things don't sound like abuse to you?" The bully was silent, and while Danny could have let it lie there, he decided to drive his point home. "Would you like it if I called you a beef-headed, roid raging, fake blond that does nothing but toss a ball around all day while I shoved you into your closet and locked you in?"

Dash paled at the thought and shook his head, taking a step back. This wasn't the Phantom he knew. Not this angry glowing being in fancy high society clothing who sounded almost as though he was considering doing what he was talking about. Or maybe he had never realized how different from his idol he truly was.

"I'm not going to do it, Dash," Danny shook his head and headed towards the window intangibly. "I'm not a bully." With that, he flew off, and the circle dimmed until the symbols were no more than frozen chalk.

* * *

 

When Danny flew over to Sam's house, he lowered himself to just outside her bedroom window before switching back to his usual hero outfit. Phasing in and dropping his invisibility, Danny knocked on the window as speaking out of nowhere tended to have Sam aiming her wristray in the direction of said voice. When she looked up from her book, something by Lovecraft again.

The goth waved and patted the spot on the bed next to her. "Sit down, we need to talk."

Quirking a brow, the halfa sat down and waited for his friend to mark her page. "Sam, I don't think I pointed out to you guys, I'm on a countdown clock and I don't know the count," he could see the worry in her eyes, a twinge of guilt working itself into his gut since Danny knew he didn't have time for whatever it was that Sam needed to talk with him about. "I'm sure whatever this is, it's important, but it has to wait for now, ok?"

Sam didn't like it, the rise in her friend's voice said he wasn't just worried but terrified. Letting out a sigh, the goth rose to her feet and switched tactics, hoping she could, at least, get some information out of the halfa for now. "Your reason for being here must be big since I noticed Elle isn't with you."

"Yeah, she and I went separate ways. I found a way to keep my parents from summoning me again, with the Ghostwriter's help." Floating off the bed, and tilting his head, he added, "Also I'm free of Walker's charges," before heading toward the window. "I need some marigold. Do you have any?" At Sam's nod, the halfa wrapped an arm around his friend and flew them both through the wall and into the greenhouse she owned in the back yard.

Minding the goth's rules about his chilling ghost form around her plants, Danny switched back to human form and relaxed ever so slightly thanks to the warmth washing over his body. One thing that disturbed him about his ghost form was that he required greater stimulation to feel certain things. "It smells to me like you got some new flowers."

"Actually, the lavender has been flourishing greatly since the last time you were in here," Sam shrugged and strolled through the large greenhouse, looking for the spot where she kept her marigold. "Can I ask why you need flowers? This hardly seems like the right time to be arranging a garden."

Danny glanced over in time to see his friend's venus fly trap clamp down on it's latest meal and shivered at the memory of experiencing the same when Undergrowth had attacked. "Apparently GW found something to help block a summoning from my parents and I decided to get twice as much so that we could perform the same ritual on Elle." He ran a hand through some plants and raised a brow when he pulled his hand back and found seeds sticking to it with some kind of liquid. Not wanting to know what it was, he phased it off over top the plant. "The ritual requires marigold and some other plants in the Spirit World that Elle apparently knows how to get to."

"Ok… and do you trust the Ghostwriter?" It wasn't an unwarranted question, given Danny's paranoia - which was easily verified by his lifestyle - but the half ghost hero's eyes widened slightly as if in surprise. "You don't usually trust your enemies to do anything good for you."

"Well… GW didn't really do much harm on Christmas," noting Sam's look of disbelief he amended his statement. "Much lasting harm anyways, since he probably predicted that everyone would come together and help put Christmas back to the way it was meant to be. And both he and I were in the wrong, like when I first met Technus."

The goth snorted at the memory of her friend's description of how their tech-obsessed enemy became their enemy. "Now see, that was almost entirely your fault Danny. Don't you know, never give a potential enemy ideas?" Laughing at the sound of an aggravated huff, Sam stopped and plucked three of the reddish gold flowers that had been growing in her care with a grin. "Well, now that you've learned your lesson about inspiring bad guys, here's that marigold you needed." Placing the stems in his hand, the goth held onto them and gave her best friend a serious and pleading look, a worried frown settling upon her features. "Come back in one piece, got it?"

"Understood," he nodded with an equally serious tone though the corners of his mouth lifted up in a small smile. "I've got too much to do to die. Town to protect, school to try and pass, friends to hang out with." Danny felt the stems fall into his hand and grinned, running for the door. "I'll be back later today! Make sure the city doesn't ignite while I'm gone!" With that and a flash of white light, he was through the wall and in the air.

When he was out of sight, Sam decided it was time to take a look at that book she had recently purchased at The Skulk and Lurk,  Kings of the Underworld.

* * *

 

As a black and white blur approached, a man in a white suit pressed two fingers to his ear and muttered, "Ectoentity number 0014 aka Danny Phantom is approaching."


	20. The Ritual

When Elle returned to the library she was mildly shocked to find herself wandering the halls of the Ghostwriter’s home alone.  Picking out a book at random, she flipped around the pages and sighed at the foreign language that looked like written morse code to her.  “Is this even a human language?”

“No, actually, that one isn’t,” the voice of the librarian spirit called out from behind her and the halfa spun around in slight surprise to meet the Ghostwriter’s floating form.  “It’s in a language now referred to as Ghost Speak, but was originally called Alomoran.  It’s the language that spirits native to this world originally spoke before english speaking ghosts passed on to this world.”  He floated down to stand next to her and read the spine of the book Elle was holding.  “That’s a book on cores.  Would you like to learn the language of the spirits?”  

Elle studied the spirit closely, suspicion crawling up her spine at the offer.  The writer seemed to be sincerely asking but she couldn’t tell why.  “Do you teach a class on it or something?  I feel like this would be great for a school for ghost kids, with all the books and the room.”

The book keeper shook his head with a slightly disappointed smile.  “I wish I did.  Perhaps I can give you a lesson later.  For now, however, do you have the reagents?”  Elle nodded and handed him the pouch that Mokuto made her and he smiled.  “Yes, this should be good.  Now all we need is the marigold and some genetic material from his parents.”  Ghostwriter flew through the library at a leisurely pace, searching for something.  “May I ask a personal question, petit fantome?”

“You can ask,” she shrugged, following behind the librarian curiously.  “No guarantee that I’ll answer, of course.”  Finding a book with an english title, Elle pulled it out of the shelf and flipped through it as the writer laughed.

“Understandable… how did you become a halfghost?”  He knew, vaguely, how Daniel and Vlad became what they were, but the writer  knew next to nothing about the origins of this young ghost girl in front of him.  Judging by the way she stiffened up, he wasn’t going to get his answer anytime soon.

“That’s a pretty personal question,” Elle said as politely as she could manage.  “I think I’ll keep the answer to myself.”

“I understand, petit fantome.”  the writer nodded and raised a brow at the book she had picked.  “An interest in the various biomes of the Spirit World?”

“Danny told me about the Far Frozen, and I know there’s more than one forest and jungle in this world, but I’m curious about other places.”  The halfa shrugged, glad for the change in subject.  “I’m an adventurer, I like to go places.  Maybe even meet some new ghosts.”

The writer responded only with a hum of intrigue.  “I see.  Well, exploring the Spirit World without knowing what core type you are is a mite dangerous, since you could find yourself in an area conflicting with your core nature.”  Seeing Elle’s raised brow, the Ghostwriter flipped the pages of her book telekinetically and tapped the page it landed upon. In the picture provided, lava wove like rivers through a large mass of craggy land the ground and trees on fire. No, trees with leaves made of fire, the same with the grass covering the place.  “For instance, your brother is an ice core and can’t exactly go running around in the volcanic jungle or the sapphire desert without risking core exhaustion.”  The sound of the doors opening stood out in the otherwise silent area, and the writer turned toward it.  “Excuse me, it appears that someone other than your brother and knight has come to the library.”

Letting the librarian spirit get to his work, Elle drifted along deeper into the building, flipping through the pages of the book in curiousity.  Unless there was some form of civilization there, she didn’t see any reason to go to the dessert.  Several of the places looked either uninhabited or deserted, and while a few caught her eye, the ghost girl didn’t feel like any of these would be places she’d go to in her sure to be dwindling free time.  Though, one place in particular did catch her eye.  “The Celestial Sea?  That’s a fancy name.”

On the page was an image of space so dark green it might have been black, dotted with spots of light of all colors.  The most brilliant of the dots, gleamed gold and silver.

* * *

 

On his way back to his house, Danny was met with the least fortunate kind of surprise.  A pair of jetsleds blazed toward him from nowhere and white-suited agents fired ectorifles.

Thankfully, Danny was a particularly fast spirit and managed to dodge most of the shots, blocking the last three with a shield.  “Are you morons serious?  I don’t have time for this!”  Two more jetsleds rose up to try and encircle the hero, but he was having none of it and split into four of himself.

“The subject is attempting to resist, detain and capture it!”  One of the agents, all of whom were nearly identical thanks to what had to be an agency policy against hair, barked out at the other three as the halfa tried to reach into their sleds and rip out some wires.

Unfortunately, the metal was somehow phase proof.  “How do you morons even have phase proof metal?  What mineral ore does that even come from?”  As he complained, the Dannys formed blades of ice and cut through the machines, one simply stabbing into the damn things and snatching away the agent as it feel.  “Honestly, I’ve got to wonder who supplies you guys with this stuff, do you buy it from someone or do you make it yourself?”  The agents were dropped onto separate rooftops, Danny merged and made his merry way back to Fentonworks, invisibly this time.

As Danny fled the scene, one agent walked out of the shadows and headed towards one of the wrecked sleds.  With a scowl etched into his face, the man reached down and pulled the ice sword that the hero had formed out of one of the sleds and examined it briefly.  “Agent Y to base, I have acquisitioned an interesting find from the aftermath of our latest encounter with the ecto entity known as Danny Phantom.”  Noting the slight glow that seemed to emanate from the weapon, the agent gave it a test swing and quirked a brow at the way it hummed just before impact against their phase proof metal.  “The labs will have fun with this.”

* * *

 

When Danny got back to his room, he raised his hand and concentrated, hoping Fright was still there after the portal had closed.  He had never tried this particular trick before, but with how thin the barrier between the spirit and human worlds had to be next to the stable portal, it should work.  

A grin spread across his face when the prince was able to feel the presence of his knight - and not on the physical plane.  Focusing on that energy, Danny opened up a portal in front of the Knight and flew in.  “My liege, I see that you’ve gotten better with your portals.” 

“I tried something new and it worked out,” Danny quickly collapsed the portal and stretched a bit.  “I’ll tell you a bit about it later, right now we need to go.”  A shudder ran through him and the sound of unfamiliar voices echoed in his head and he had to concentrate on staying in the Spirit World instead of following the tug on his core.

When the two arrived at the library, they were surprised with the haunting of ghosts at the library.  He even saw Kitty and Ember in one section, reading their own respective books and chatting rather quietly considering who it was.  “How long did it take me to get back?”

“Around forty-four minutes or so,” came the voice of the youngest halfa, who appeared in front of her brother.  “You’re lucky Jazz got to your parents after the first ten minutes and asked them about all the ways ectoplasm could be used in the human world.  Jack and Maddie haven’t stopped talking about the science behind converting ectoplasmic energy into electrical energy.”

“Judging by the fact that you haven’t turned off your communicator to tune out of that explanation,” the Ghostwriter flew over towards them and gestured for the three royal spirits to follow behind him, “That you are enjoying the science lesson?”  With no time to waste, the writer teleported them all into a different room there in.  “Before you ask, yes, it is in fact much larger inside of Vydia than it is outside.”

Upon entering the room the visitors were surprised.  Danny thought the beakers and test tubes and microscopes all over desks were reminiscent of his parents' lab but the tools were unfamiliar. Fright Knight glanced at the magical reagents stored on the shelves, numerous kinds of chalk and odd circles and concluded alchemy. Was Ghost Writer some manner of sorcerer in his free time?  Elle wasn’t all  _ that _ surprised, since the writer was obviously an intelligent spirit and must have time to do more than just write books.  Even in this room, of course, there were still several ceiling high shelves of books, though less numerous.

Unlike the rest of the well organized library, everything seemed completely randomized, the space filled by counter tops that held the equipment that hadn’t been put away the last time that the writer had been in the library, scrolls littered about and a few scorch marks that suggested less than successful tests.  

Off to a cleared space of the floor, a circle was drawn - about twelve meters in diameter - with intricately drawn symbols all along the edges with room for more symbols in the center.  The Ghostwriter turned to Danny with an unexpected question.  “What are the details of your summoning circle?  The complete circle.”  Danny’s eyebrows rose at the emphasis.  “This ritual works best if every component of the summoning is presented.  If there’s anything your friends may have an idea of for the circle that you might not have thought of, now is your last chance to consult them.”

Nodding the ghost boy tapped his FentonPhone and contacted his friends and sister.  “Guys, I got a question for ya that’s kind of urgent.”  It had been a long while since he escaped the lab, Jazz could only distract his parents for so long, even if she had convinced them to blather on about ectoplasm.  That had been minutes? Hours ago? Higher and higher rose a chance for his parents to summon. “Is there anything missing from this list?  A snowflake or ice symbol, the crown, a thorned rose, a motherboard, a book, a feather, and my DP at the center right?”

“ _ Actually Danny, _ ” Jazz’s voice cut in before Tucker or Sam could call an affirmative.  “ _ A circle i had used for a deal between us included a gun in the symbols. _ ”  This left all three younger teens bemused.

“A gun?  Why would that apply to me at all?”  Even as Danny said it, the Ghostwriter was at work, drawing the images presented in great detail.  “I don’t tend to use guns.  Also what about the mom and dad situation?”

“ _ I managed to slip away for a quick bathroom break, but I can’t take too long.”   _  Jazz hesitated, and Danny knew that she was pausing to think up a good cover up.  “ _ You don’t use guns a lot but you do get shot at by ectoguns rather often though. _ ”  it was a passable lie he supposed, but there would be questions later.

“Makes sense.  I’ll get back to you guys after the ritual is over, ok?”  Getting an affirmative from everyone, he switched off the FentonPhone and handed it to Elle.  Watching the chalk lines form a more complete version of his summoning circle, Danny had to admit, he felt a certain kind of magnetic pull towards it, like it would make him stronger just to be in the center of it.

When the last stroke of the chalk stick was finished, the symbols pulsated with a pale blue light.  “Stand here in the center of the circle, and Elle it would actually be best if you stood there at the symbol representing you.”  The writer gestured to the elder halfa for confirmation. “Circles like this are basically circuit boards that allow for adjustable pathways for the energy flowing through the worlds naturally and each difference allows for a slightly different outcome.  Placing that which the symbol represents over it adds to the circuit, making success easier and more likely.”

As Elle floated up to find her spot with an expectant look towards her brother, the reagents he had gathered floated out of his bag, and into a bowl where the reagents Elle had collected rested. In the writer’s hand was a mortar with which he began to grind everything together.  “Ok, Elle the feather is supposed to be you.  Val said that it was meant to represent how free a spirit you are.”  And while it probably had deeper meaning, they didn’t really have time since the reality warping Knowledge Seeker had already finished crushing everything into some kind of pasty dark substance that held a faint white glow and was dipping a brush in it.

“For this part I’ll need as much access to skin as you are comfortable with,” the writer explained as the book floated first in front of Danny so he could see why this was needed, and then in front of the Ghostwriter again when he was behind the prince.  “I must mark the symbols described upon you with this matra, as the book called it, made from all that you gathered.”

“I’m gonna be looking over at those bookshelves then,” Elle said as she turned away from her brother with a bit of bright green tinting her cheeks.  “Actually, can I read while we do this?”

“Sorry but no.”  The writer let out a wry chuckle as Danny phased off all but his boxers.  “I’ll work as quickly as I can, time is of the essence.”  Even now, as the Ghostwriter wrote on him, Danny could imagine his parents drawing out the circle in chalk instead of burning it into the floor with a laser again, and readying up their weapons.  

“Going off of the symbolism thing, shouldn’t Fright stand over the crown symbol, since knights are royalty and he’s the one who confirmed that I’m the prince?”  Danny’s gaze shifted to his knight and the Halloween spirit moved into place without a word.  

In five minutes that felt like eternity, the cool ink like substance tingled on Danny’s skin as the writer finished and floated back to the book.  And as the purple clothed spirit began to speak, his words echoed with a kind of lilt like he was singing the foreign words.  Enough power gathered to make the hairs on the halfa’s neck stand up and the lines go from a dim pulsing light to flashes akin to a heartbeat; the ghost boy knew something was wrong.

More than one voice could be heard, though only by him, speaking the invocation that had come to cause him so much grief in so little time, clashing with the words of protection and safety from the most dangerous of these.  The world around him faded away and was replaced by the human world, but a part of it he had never seen before.  It was a warehouse, he knew, but it wasn’t in Amity.  The place reeked of fish and the sunlight outside was too bright to be his town and there was a bunch of fish at the center of his circle and he saw a bit of snow fall around the edges.

Then the image changed to some kid’s bedroom.  The guy was wearing a basketball jersey with the number 02 on it.  The ginger looked somewhat familiar, as though Danny had seen him before when he was busy.  The scowl on his face said this call was definitely a decline.

The scene shifted once more, but this time it was… unusual.  More so than per the norm for Danny.  Everything was black and white with splashes of gold and specks of green.  Figures could be seen all around, shadowy silhouettes of things, and amalgamations that he couldn’t even begin to describe.  Something vaguely humanoid with a warped skull drew closer and Danny felt a chill sink into his very bones, past the power and confidence of his Phantom form and into his human form, his living bones and skin and blood.  Dread filled his every cell.

He wrenched himself away, back to the library surrounded by shining blue and green lines.  The energy in the room rushed towards him.  Danny could feel the power wrap around his core, a padlock without a key, and the final words of Ghostwriter’s incantation faded out of the halfa’s awareness.  Elle’s voice could be faintly heard calling out his name high and frantic and his knight did the same but with his title instead, but their voices were distant and everything around the room blurred.  All Danny was sure of, was that something was very very wrong.


	21. Envy

"Danny!" Elle's too high scream of horror tore through the FentonPhone and jerked Tucker out of his project.  Halting his testing—which had gone pretty well considering all the charred junk around him - he bolted for FentonWorks and its portal, hoping to sneak past the Fentons and get into the Zone.  Fate decided to toss him a nice speed bump.  The familiar sound of jet engines descended upon the technogeek, who started running when he heard the click of a pair of shoulder mounted missile launchers rising into place.  “Why are you attacking  _ me _ when Danny isn’t even here?”  Tucker could guess a few reasons but if he kept Skulker talking, he could find a good weak point in his armor again.

“Because, weak human,” the self proclaimed greatest hunter shouted as he held up a red and black thermos with a grin on his face plate.  “My target is you this time, not the ghost child.  Of course, I’m simply dropping off a present for you.”  With a twist of the cap, he pointed the thermos toward Tucker and grinned as a dark green mist poured out and coalesced into a form that Tucker hadn’t seen in months.  One he had hoped to never see it again.

The monster had broad shoulders and was covered in muscles.  Beefy arms ended in sharp claws that flexed experimentally with newfound freedom.  Behind black rimmed glasses, a pair of red eyes blazed with pure hatred.  It was his jealousy towards Danny’s power, created by Desiree.  “Remind me never to form another poltergeist.”  In response to this, Tucker Phantom roared.

“Enjoy,” Skulker shouted cheerily as he flew off.  A fist slammed into to the concrete where Tucker had just been.  Tucker would have to blast that faceplate off after he disabled the armor again.  Though that needed to wait.

Rolling to his feet, Tuck ran behind a fence and checked the white, metallic gauntlet on his arm.  Thanks to his adjustments and the Fenton’s research added to his own, it didn’t feel like a lead brick.  “Ok Tuck, what do we remember about this one?  Mostly muscle, not all that focused on brains.”  Hearing a growl he rolled to a new spot of cover, thankful for all the garbage left in the junkyard since that made it easier to get out of sight and stay there.  “Has yet to develop ectoblast capabilities, most likely a high powered class three.”  Flexing his arm, the teen grinned at the whining hum of a charging ectoblaster.  “This should be a good field test.”

* * *

 Clockwork was an ancient being, older than most others in the whole of the spirit world.  The only ones who were their elders were the Observant high council and their teacher Clockwise, the first Timekeeper to take up Clockwork’s current position.  

Of course, Clockwork knew, outside of the Spirit World there were many beings older than they, unfortunately.  And even less fortunately, some of those beings had influence over the energies of Time as much as they did.  Even if they noticed that something was wrong, they didn’t know what exactly that was.  And depending on how long it took them to understand, Time could fall to chaos.

Of course, other times it could be something incredibly inconsequential.  They usually knew the difference. The difference between their teapot going missing, and an earthquake happening where it shouldn’t have.  A book out of place and a plague starting at a time when no one was prepared for it.  They usually saw a large block in their time visions and it didn’t go away until they went out and saw for themselves the damage these creatures had wrought.  So this time?

When Clockwork noticed they were blind to parts of the current timeline, they looked around the Citadel and after critical inspection realized something.  

The thermos was gone.  

When demons interfered, Clockwork usually knew that all was not as it should be, and that they  _ must _ interfere for the preservation of Time.  When things were going fine, they knew everything was going just as it should be.

Right now Clockwork, for the first time in their life, did not know whether or not everything was as it should be.

* * *

 Tucker was not as unathletic as his classmates thought.  Another super-fast punch landed where he'd been a second ago, flattening his previous hiding space.  He could run pretty fast, he had to dodge pretty well, but one thing he didn’t have in spades was stamina.  Which was why he wondered how his poltergeist had so much of it.  Tucker was running out of places to take cover behind as he blasted the ectoplasmic mimicry with his experimental gauntlet.  It was made to fit hands of his general size, and fired off a beam about as strong as the lipstick laser.  “Why won’t you go down?”

“Why won’t you die?”  The mimic growled out as he was struck in the face once again.  Talons grazed his human counterpart’s sleeve but he was jabbed in the gut in response.  “You aren’t supposed to be this good!”

“What, don’t think I can manage without powers?”  Tuck hoped he didn’t sound half as offended as he was by that question.  Another blast to the chest to push the poltergeist away and he was around a larger mound of garbage.  “Never underestimate the TF, you’ll get hurt.”  Letting out a quick huff of breath, Tucker went over what he knew about his own body.  If this guy was as based off of him as Skulker was probably hoping - though the hunter was most likely thinking about how Tuck’s jealousy would be able to find him not about physiostructural similarities - then Tucker should be able to deal with this green goon with the little remaining power in his gauntlet.  

Rolling out from his cover again, once the poltergeist was turned away from him, the technogeek aimed a finger at the back of the copy’s ear and fired off a blast, grinning at the cry of pain before blasting at the exact center of his chest with the palm of the gauntlet.  “You’re pathetic.  I thought that you’d have gotten at least harder to fight than Danny was when you were formed.”  

The Poltergeist snarled and turned around to slash at his original with his talons, only to find his claws going through empty space.  “I’m plenty harder to beat than that loser!”  When Tucker moved to fire off a blast, the copy dodged it and surged toward the trash Tuck had been hiding behind.  “Even he couldn’t beat me back then!”

“Yeah, back then.”  Firing off a shot to the eyes to blind his envious opponent, the technogeek found some scrap metal to hide behind and cupped his hands so that his voice would carry.  “Of course, I could have taken him down back then if I wanted, no powers needed.”  Grinning at the growl of frustration he heard right before another pile of trash got smashed, Tucker took aim at another pressure point in the back and swore when he missed.  “Now Danny’s the prince of the Ghost Zone and you’re still stuck back in last year!”  Rolling out of the way when the green monster charged at him, Tucker managed to grab onto his tail with the gauntlet and swing him into a trash mound.  “I can’t believe I let myself get as lame as you are.”

“SHUT UP!”  The poltergeist roared in outrage at what he was hearing and charged again, swinging blindly and snarling when he missed.  “I AM BETTER THAN THAT ARROGANT, WORTHLESS, SMARTASS OF A FAILED GHOST HUNTER!” Tucker's punch knocked the wind out of the monster. He reeled back when something hot and metallic pressed against his throat, too late now to escape the iron grip.  

“No, you’re nothing more than a cheap imitation.”  Firing off the strongest blast he could without completely draining his gauntlet, Tucker smirked down at the unconscious heap of jealousy that fell from his hand.  Pulling out his Fenton Thermos, he sucked the ghost in and pulled out his phone.  

It had taken quite a bit of tweaking, but he had managed to copy the technology used in the Fenton’s boo-merang and the ecto exodus alert system to detecta ghost's high ectoplasmic energy, instead of the residual background energy blanketing Amity.  Nothing turned up though.  “That’s as bad as it could be good,” Tuck muttered as he turned on his Fenton Phone, taking a shortcut back to his place.  “Sam, watch your back.”

A hiss that had nothing to do with static rang out in the FentonPhone, followed by Sam’s sarcastic drawling of “ _ You don’t say? _ ”

* * *

 Danny woke up in a bed not his own, in clothes not the norm for his ghost form.  Absently, he wondered why he hadn’t reverted back to human upon passing out, but pushed the arbitrary thought away for the moment.  Slowly opening his eyes, he stared at the purple ceiling for a moment and let his eyes adjust to the light.  “Why does it feel like I got hit by a train?”

“Someone may have been trying to summon you onto a train.”  Looking over to the source of the voice, Danny saw his little sister giving him a small concerned smile.  “I don’t exactly know how the physics works with the whole summoning thing works.  How ya doing?”  Elle lay a faintly glowing hand on his head which was feeling quite a bit better, and she looked strained.

“Guilty, knowing my little sister put so much energy into healing me up that she looks like she hasn’t had any sleep in a week.”  When she stopped, Danny slowly sat up and cracked a smile.  “I’m glad you’re eager to learn and use your healing abilities, but don’t over exert yourself, Elle.”  A frown replaced smile quickly as he remembered the situation.  “What all happened and how long have I been out?”  

“The Ghostwriter managed to complete the ritual and Jazz checked as your parents tried another summoning,” Elle grinned and sat on the bed next to him.  “It worked.  You’re immune to being summoned by your parents.”

Danny nodded, glad that whatever it was he had been seeing hadn’t interfered with the ritual.  Though he could tell by the look on Elle’s face, that there was more to hear.  “And?”

“Tucker was attacked by Skulker and a poltergeist he said was formed by Desiree and himself,” she continued with clear confusion in her tone, brow raised in expectation of an explanation.  “And Sam got attacked by a giant ghost snake.  She decapitated it and then everyone demanded to know what happened to you.  I’m also pretty curious, cause you seemed extremely out of it when GW started chanting.”

The memory of the thing he had seen in his last vision before everything faded to black made him shudder.   “I’ll tell you when everyone’s together, but for now I’d love to know how long I’ve been unconscious, because the avoidance really isn’t helping.”

Elle shrugged and counted off in her head, since she had been more concerned with making sure that Danny woke up at all than with what time it had been.  “About, an hour.  That’s not normal for this, or so the book details.”  Reaching over to a nightstand next to the bed, the ghost girl handed her brother a bundle of black and white clothes.  “Ghostwriter said that he would apologize about the jumpsuit but all the energy disintegrated it.”

The halfa furrowed his brows at that, his next transformation would materialize his suit, but accepted the bundle regardless.  “Uh, thanks for telling me, but can I get some privacy for this part?”  Elle nodded with a splash of green painting her cheeks and left the room.  Two minutes later, Danny found himself in black pants with a bright white belt, as well as a long sleeved black turtleneck that held his DP decal on the chest.

Walking out of the room, Danny raised a brow at Elle and spread out his arms.  “How do I look?”

A slightly strained smile formed on Elle’s face at the question and she snorted.  “Like a cosplayer that couldn’t afford a proper jumpsuit.  And uh, Danny?”  The elder halfa didn’t like the way her voice got softer and higher, the way his did when he didn’t want to point something out to someone.

“Yes, Elle?  Is there something on my face?”  Danny jokingly asked, but frowned when Elle’s less than sincere smile fell.  “Something went wrong?”

“Take off your glove.  I know you already put everything on but there’s something you probably didn’t notice.”  There was worry clear in her voice and instead of making a joke, Danny tugged the glove off of his left hand and stared at it.  “Ghostwriter said that it’d take a moment to realize what’s different when we found out  _ what _ happened.”  Nothing out of the ordinary, just his hand.  As he was about to ask what the fuss was about he realized the problem.

The skin had the imprint of a circle on the palm and from that circle in all directions and up his wrist, was a lichtenberg scar.  He had expected it the day he became a half ghost, as did his parents when they heard about the shock he had gotten from it.  One doesn’t get hit with that much electricity and not get such a marking.  Being half ghost may have simply kept the scar from cropping up for as long as it took to get there.  That wasn’t the alarming part.  What had Danny’s breath catching in his throat was his  _ blue  _ skin.

* * *

 Danny woke up in a place he wasn’t expecting at all.  The floor was some beige carpet and the walls were orange with some newspaper clippings hung up along them.  There was a bed, like his but bigger, for a taller person than him.  The most noticeable part of the room was the kid standing in front of him with a victorious smirk on his face.  “Didn’t know you answered your summoning calls in your disguise, Phantom.”  Glancing down at his hand and the floor again, Danny could confirm that he was - somehow - still in human form.  And he was in his summoning circle.  Lovely.

“Uh, I have no idea what you’re talking about, dude,” Danny murmured as he rose to his feet, head swimming slightly.  “I think that teleporter watch we were working on failed… crap, it’s gone!”  The halfa - he really hoped he was still a halfa, since he couldn’t feel his ghost half - looked down at his wrist with wide eyes, covering his face with his other hand.  “Oh man!  Sam paid for all the equipment we needed to make that too, I can’t pay for all of that without telling my parents.”

“Cut the crap Phantom, I know it’s you.”  The ginger growled out with a basketball under his arm.  “Unlike everyone else in that stupid town of yours, I can plainly see the similarities between you and your disguise as Fenton.”

“I don’t know what disguise you’re talkin about kid, but I have to get back home before my parents start worrying.”  When Danny walked over the chalk, he felt a slight tug on  _ something _ inside of him that was definitely not his ghost core, but he was still able to walk past it and that was the immediate problem.  Heading towards the door, he waved at the shocked basketball player.  “Buh-bye.”

“I have an offering for you though, Phantom.”  As the taller probably suspected, that did stop Danny in his tracks, the raven haired teen turning with a raised brow as his hand came to rest upon the doorknob.  “A basketball that i’ve held onto for years, since i was a kid, in exchange for you telling me just how you’re doing this whole disguise thing so that no one else figures it out, and why you’re doing it.”

Letting out a snort of laughter, Danny shook his head and opened the door to leave.  “Dunno what you’re on, kid, but the team won’t like it when they find out.  Should probably stop using it.” And then he was down the stairs and racing out the door before he could be spotted by anyone else.

Once on the street, Danny took a few breaths and ran on his neck, blinking in surprise when he felt more hair back there than he was used to having.  “Great, I have a tail in the back… actually, I was wondering why there wasn’t one like a year ago, I haven’t had a haircut for so long.”  He had figured that his ghost half had been doing something to his growth.  The fact that it all grew in so suddenly probably meant that the ritual had gone more wrong than he thought at first.

Fishing his phone out of his pocket, Danny dialed Tucker, wondering where he was.  The technogeek picked up on the third ring.  “ _ Danny?  Why are you calling me on your cell instead of the Fen- _ ”

“Tuck, breathe,” it was something that Danny and his friends sometimes had to remind each other to do, and that was alarming when it was him.  “Something must have happened during the ritual because I can’t feel my core.”  There was a hint of panic in his voice, but the teen managed to mostly keep himself under control.  “So, do you guys know where Phantom is?”

Tucker needed a moment to process all of that, before relaying what was said into his FentonPhone, then responding “ _ Far as I know, he’s still at GW’s library with Elle and Frightknight.  He’s in a secure location, but where are you?” _  With the question came the realization that Danny had started walking without knowing where exactly he was going.  

Stopping in his tracks, the halfa looked around and spotted a street sign that looked somewhat familiar.  “Based on the street signs, i think i’m in Elmerton.  If I can find Val’s place, i can get home from there.”  Nodding in self affirmation, he pulled out the regular bluetooth that Tucker had insisted he have just in case and switched it on while he put in Valerie’s address on his phone.  “Anything else happen?”

“ _ Sam just finished up dealing with a ghost snake before I could get there and Skulker sicced my poltergeist that we never wished away on me, but we’re both relatively fine. _ ”  The sound of a door opening caught Danny’s attention, and he stopped when a car cut across the street.  “ _ I got to test a fun project out on it. _ ”

“Project?”  Even as he parroted his friend, he knew the tech loving teen would rather show them than tell them over the phone what he had made.  “Ok, so, you’ve got it in the thermos?”  Turning a corner, Danny alternated between scanning the skies and checking his phone.  An attack wasn't likely out here in Elmerton - most of the ghosts they found in Elmerton were peaceful and just hanging around to see their loved ones - but with Skulker setting loose less than peaceful ghosts on his friends, the youngest Fenton couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going to happen.  And he had no idea if he still had his ghost sense.

The dull sound of a hoverboard, recognizable from all the times he had encountered Valerie and all the times he and his parents had constructed hover engines in the lab, reverberated.  Turning towards it, he saw the Red Huntress hovering only around five feet in the air, and it seemed like she was looking at him.

“Uh,” he opened his mouth, reaching up to scratch the back of his neck, and waved.  “Hello?  You’re the Red Hun-” but before he could finish his question, three familiar metal cubes appeared around her head and charged up a blast.

* * *

 George had to admit, he was surprised.  Normally, Rick would try to shake off the pain that came with losing a fight and walk around a bit before falling in bed and claiming he was simply tired.  Admitting he was too sore to do so was new, and George made sure to be extra gentle when placing ice packs on his brother.  “You really took a beating, huh?”

“Yeah,” the brunette croaked out with a grimace.  “Sam really knows what she’s doing in a fight.  I couldn’t even dodge once.”  Hearing his bespectacled twin chuckle, Rick managed a glare.  “Doesn’t mean I can’t kick  _ your _ ass anyday of the week.”

An amused brow rose as George smirked.  “Oh?  So, you can kick my ass right now?  In bed?  Bruised as hell?”  His brother’s glare intensified and George laughed.  “You said any day, bro.  That includes today.”

“Fali sur asinam,” Rick half grumbled under his breath, a look of concentration on his face. There was a strange tingle in the back of his skull, and as the feeling spread throughout the rest of his head he saw a flash of silvery white light.  In the next moment, George was on his bum, on the floor, bewilderment clear in his expression.  “Kick your ass any day of the week.”  The shock painting his brother’s features was priceless, though in the moment Rick was a bit too tired to fully appreciate what he had just done.

“Did … did you just…” the bespectacled teen stared at his twin in slack jawed awe.  Rick said something in what sounded something like a mix of latin and something else, and then he was thrown off the bed.  Unless a ghost had found their way into the house and shoved him with perfectly coincidental timing, Rick’s words had thrown him off the bed.  “Did you just use magic?”

Rick blinked at his brother, thoughts pushing through the pulsing throb of pain radiating from the part of his jaw and side of his head where Sam had hit him and realization struck almost as hard as she did - though he wasn’t sure if anything could actually hit him  _ as _ hard as she did.  “I just… used magic.  Dude, i just used magic!”  A quick move to sit up reminded him just why he hadn’t been already, and he fell back down onto the soft sheets of his bed.  “ _ Ow!” _

“Calm down man.”  George frowned and put another ice pack down on the other’s temple, telekinetically.  “Unless you have something to heal yourself up, don’t move too much.”  The grin that stretched across Rick’s bruised face had the younger twin rolling his eyes.  “Are you sure you want to do that?  You’re exhausted and you’ve only just figured out that you can do that.”

“And you boiled milk on the first day of having telekinesis, along with lifting every utensil within a ten foot radius, and the liquid itself,” Rick countered with a snarky tone.  “Now hush and let me concentrate.”  The bespectacled teen conceded his brother’s point and nodded, backing up a bit and sitting in their wheely chair.

Taking as deep a breath as he could manage to without hurting himself, Rick closed his eyes and concentrated.  He wasn’t sure what he had felt before, but he knew that he wanted to feel it again. The boxer concentrated on the tingling feeling echoing through his mind..  It fled from his mental reach, and it took several tries.  Eventually, however, he grasped it as tight as he could.   _ I don’t want to be stuck in bed for the next week. _  He thought angrily, figuring that if he thrust his desires upon the feeling he could make it work..   _ I have things I need to do, and i have to be able to walk without feeling pain.  I want to tell Danny what I know about him, I want to be able to go to my next match and I  _ need _ to be able to be there for him when George’s weird powers screw him over!  If I have magic, I need to use it. _

At first, nothing seemed to happen.  But as he … spoke, to the energy, Rick could feel it growing stronger.  Then, the feeling spread over the whole of his mind like wild fire, as intense as an inferno but cold like ice water.  The words jumped to the forefront of his mind and flowed from his mouth like water from a stream.  “Obsecro, sinjoro Leuirath, da mihi virtutem curandi opus.  Ĉu mi povas restarigi ilin.”

George jumped in his chair as a light brighter than anything he’d seen, short of the sun, spread from his twin‘s forehead and over his whole body, wrapping around him like coils.  The intense light burned his eyes, forcing the slightly younger twin to close them tightly and turned away.  Yet the light burned like frost, it was cold, colder than the ice storm that snowed them in, three years ago right after christmas.  The feeling of it sent shivers down his spine.

As quickly as the light had come, it vanished.  In it’s wake, Rick lay on the bed, only a few bruises left that either twin could see.  Slowly, cautiously, Rick flexed his muscles and grinned to find that he was no more sore than he was after a hard win in a boxing match.  Sitting up with a bit less caution brought a few pangs, but he could work through it.  

Turning to his brother, Rick beamed and tackled George to the ground.  “GEORGE I DID IT!”  Laughing ecstatically, he got up and stretched.  “Dude, I just healed myself after getting my butt handed to me on a silver platter, I’m feeling pretty awesome right now.”  Picking up the chair and his brother, the boxer bounced on his feet a bit.

“How… did you do that, and what words came out of your mouth?”  To say George was dazed would be the understatement of the week.  It’s not everyday you see your brother get engulfed in light and healed by magic.  “Did you just cast a healing spell?  Did you learn that in those journals upstairs?   _ How _ did you do that?”  His voice grew higher and louder with his last question, mind racing for answers and discarding possibilities as quickly as he processed the thoughts.  “Dude, this is amazing!’  The bespectacled teen shouted as his brain got itself back together.  “You can use magic!  Do you know how awesome that is?”

“Bro, let us not forget that you are a telekinetic, hm?”  Rick sat down on the bed and felt exhaustion wash over him like a wave at the beach when he was five.  “I don’t think I’ll be doing that kind of thing again anytime soon, I feel like passing out and throwing up at the same time.  Please, dim the lights.”

“You  _ are _ aware that the desk lamp stays on while I write up some notes, right?”  Faithful brother or not, George had some writing to do.  There was just too much information to trust himself with remembering unaided.  At the nod he was given, George pushed up his glasses, returned to the chair, and pulled out his writing supplies telekinetically.

A pencil, a leather bound book with completely blank pages, and his phone and headphones laid out on their shared desk and the lights were flicked off after an insisting whine from the bottom bunk.  “I’m gonna levitate you back up into your bed when I go to sleep, so don’t get too comfy in there.”  Ignoring the other flipping him off, George put in his headphones and turned on some upbeat guitar instrumental as he got to writing in his beloved journal - the first note being that it was apparently a family tradition for Pates to keep journals - both twins unaware of the dim, violet light pulsating from the dreamcatcher hanging over Rick’s pillow.  Neither saw when the light stopped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for taking so long to post, i took a nap


	22. The Prince and the Hunter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danny shows off that he does, in fact, have some gods damned muscle under that baggy ass clothing, Phantom demonstrates a capability for diplomacy, and Val realizes once more that everything is not what it seems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i hate me too, go ahead and lay into me about the lack of updates here, but i've got the whole thing finished now. so here's the second to last part of Danny's sunday

" _ Elle, you're forgetting a certain chunk of info there _ ," Sam's voice cut through the tense moment at the Ghost Writer's library. " _ He's also been separated from his human half somehow, and we have to get him away from wherever Valerie took him _ ." The ghost boy's eyes widened further upon hearing that his human-self was with Valerie, though that was quickly eclipsed by the fact that  _ his skin was blue and he looked like  _ Him  _ and he refused to be like Him _ .

"Uh, yeah, Danny's currently looking at his blue hand and freaking out internally, I'll have to get back to you on the whole, human half thing." Elle reached out carefully and placed a gentle hand on her brother's shoulder. "Danny, look at me. I get being shocked, but I'm not exactly sure why you're freaking out right now." Emerald eyes flicked over to the walls of the library in concern before refocusing on icy blue. "You're spreading frost on the library and I don't think she appreciates that. I'm gonna tell you exactly what you look like, ok?" A slow nod, the area growing even colder as Danny's expression did the same. "You have blue skin, blue eyes, and a lightning scar going up to your face. You know what clothes you have on right now. That's all that's changed, no second head or antennae or anything like that. Ok?"

Taking in a few, unnecessary, breaths, Danny nodded and reigned in more control over his powers, the frost dissipating. "No red eyes?" That would have been too much for him to handle, knowing that his ghost would be so like Him when his human-self died, though knowing that his ghost half would live on was a slightly comforting thought. "No fangs?" With a negative from Elle, the prince sagged against the wall in relief. "Thank the Ancients."

"What was the freak out all about? I'd rather not look like the Box Ghost in any way shape or form either, but that was a bit dramatic." A small grin rose to her features as the same came to Danny. Helping him up, she poked his chest. "Any stories you forgot to tell me?"

"A story I'm hoping to forget," he mumbled to himself before shaking the dark thoughts of the possible future from his mind. "I  _ might _ tell you some other time. For now, though…" he floated through the library, going faster when he saw that, yes Elle was following him, and grinned when he saw the Fright Knight. "Fright Knight, I have a mission for you," he ordered. Elle's had never heard such a commanding tone from the older halfa.

The Knight bowed at the waist and stood at attention, ready to carry out any orders from his liege. "I need you to go to the human world. Find Sam and Tucker, and once they've secured my human half, bring them all back here. We'll need my other self to figure out how to fuse back together after all." Fright nodded and went to his stead, whilst Danny turned to his sister, "Elle," he commanded, "I need you to go to princess Dora and tell her what's happening. I'm sure she's freaking out about all of this by now, it's been several hours now."

"Alright, but what about you, oh suddenly wise leader?" The ghost girl folded her arms, wondering where this was all coming from and what Danny's plan was. "Are you going to be waiting here for our return, because Dora would probably appreciate your presence during this explanation if you've got no other plans."

"I need to go see a friend about something that's been bugging me." He'd tell her about Clockwork and the mess with Dan some other time, but right now he had an opportunity to ask the Master of Time something he had been meaning to throughout all this summoning chaos. "I'll tell you when I get back, but I need to go see them."

Elle nodded with a sigh and a pout but flew off to go reassure the dragon princes that her brother was, in fact, alive. Mostly.

Meanwhile, Danny flew off towards the Citadel of Time, turning invisible and doing his best to cloak his ectosignature. He had to talk with Clockwork about a certain halfghost.

* * *

 

Jasmine Dana Fenton was many things. A great student, a loving sister, an obviously intelligent young lady, a brown belt in taijutsu, responsible, and a teacher's pet. Patient was definitely high up there as well. She had put up with her parents' craziness for seventeen years of her life, and only snapped at them twenty-seven times that she could remember. After distracting her parents long enough for the ritual to be completed and the results found positive, she could pause, breathe and think 'my parents almost vivisected my little brother.' A fact she had known before but never keenly registered now.

"Filthy ectoplasmic spook has something to do with—"

Jasmine Fenton snapped for the twenty-eighth time.

"Enough!" The redhead stormed down to the basement, a hot fury burning in her eyes, undeterred by her parents' shocked faces. "I have had enough of your ridiculous, baseless claims! How do you know that ghosts are all evil? What proof do you have that every last one of them is void of even an ounce of morality?"

"Jazz—a" Jack began.

Jazz wouldn't be interrupted, not this time. "You've never sat down to talk to a ghost, you've never interviewed one or had a conversation with a ghost, you've never listened to one! All you've ever done is attack them, hunt them down even when they haven't done anything to anyone. Just the other day, you shot at Johnny and Kitty in the middle of their date."

"Those filthy ghosts were disturbing the pea-" but she cut Jack off in the middle of his tirade, her voice cold as steel.

"They were half a mile away from Amity Park. They weren't a threat to anyone, they weren't disturbing anyone; all they were doing was stargazing. You attacked a pair of teenagers who had done nothing hostile towards either of you." The glare he received stopped any response Jack could think of. "You have never approached a ghost with any mentality other than hostile and aggressive, and the few times you've caught a ghost, you immediately vivisect them."

" _ Dissect _ , Jasmine, sweety, not vivisect," Maddie cooly corrected her daughter, confused by this sudden outburst but thinking of it as a form of teenage rebellion. "We can't vivisect something that's not alive."

"And how do you know if a living or deathly state applies to a being from another dimension?" Frustration and desperation danced in Jazz's tone, anger fueling the words that shot out of her mouth. "Twenty years you spent on this quasi-stable interdimensional vortex, five times before that that you've gotten us sucked into other dimensions that you weren't even aiming for, and not once have you ever said a word about encountering a ghost before the portal in our basement started working. Not once have you spoken of talking with, fighting, or even seeing a ghost beyond the ones that come out of that portal. Not in Mexico when you fought against that demon, not in California where you encountered that werewolf. Not once have you ever actually spoken with a ghost. Not before the portal opened, and not after.

"So what grounds do you have to go off of to hypothesize all ghosts are evil? That every last spirit, specter and ghoul is a horrible, amoral, putrid piece of ectoplasm empty of feelings? What scientific evidence do you have supporting your hypothesis that ghosts aren't alive? Have either of you ever even been  _ in _ the Ghost Zone? You have the technology for it, you had me construct that Model VI Gravity Inverter for the Specter Speedster and I've seen how fast the propulsion systems can push it, the defensive systems are fully capable in case of an emergency; you've got the perfect opportunity of  _ any time  _ to go into the Ghost Zone to see it for yourself, talk to the local ghosts in there and learn more about ghosts than you could ever find out from forcibly capturing them, but you haven't gone in and you don't try!

"The two of you work on a blinding bias that all ghosts are evil without even having any proof or basis for that hypothesis to back it up. You've got proof otherwise on a semi-daily basis!" The bemused expressions on her parents' faces did nothing to appease her foul temper or the disappointment in the two scientists before her. "Not once in your whole lives have you ever questioned whether or not there might be good ghosts out there? What about your parents or grandparents or great-grandparents? Are their ghosts evil? Are their ghosts even in the Ghost Zone? Do you have any idea? Have you ever gone in to talk to them, to ask them questions that you never could bring yourselves to when they were alive, to be with your family again?"

Maddie's jaw worked but no sound came out. Jack sputtered incoherently and rather quietly, relatively speaking. Neither ectobiologist had an answer for their daughter's questions or responses to her statements. The lack of response simply drew an irritated huff from the eldest Fenton child.

"I can't believe that you two have been so unscientific for all these years in your attitudes towards ghosts. The entirety of Amity Park treats the issue of ghosts more rationally than you two, and you're the leading scientists in the field of paranormal science! I've heard the screams of the ghosts you've vivisected, seen the way you regard any thoughts towards ghosts, heard the way you talk about them without a second thought. I can assure you that what you committed was murder, Drs. Fenton, and I can't stand to see you act so unprofessionally any longer."

With that, Jasmine Dana Fenton stalked up the stairs of the Fenton laboratory and from there up to her room to study for her test tomorrow, leaving a pair of stunned and shocked scientists in her wake.

* * *

 

Normally, Valerie would have given a little warning before firing off a blast in the direction of someone as easily frightened as Danny Fenton, but when a twenty-foot turtle with a green crab shell rushed towards said friend, she felt inclined to act first and explain later.

To the Ex-popular's great surprise, Fenton jumped out of the way almost to the other side of the street, rolled to his feet and glared in her direction before looking to see what she had shot at. Still, he was a civilian with no ghost fighting training, and it was her duty to get him to safety before it was to fight the ghost in front of her. "Get out of here before you get hurt!" She shouted at the boy before aiming another blast at the turtle, which was shrugging off the stunning shot to the face. It charged once again, this time at her, and she dodged out of the way with ease, though she hadn't been expecting a whip of the ghost's tail, which caught the underside of her board and flung her off balance for a moment.

When the huntress righted herself, it was to the sight of Danny Fenton,  _ the _ Danny Fenton who disappeared every time a ghost was so much as mentioned near him, firing at the turtle monster with what looked like one of his parents' wrist rays. He jumped out of the way of another charge and fired at exposed green flesh, distracting it enough for Valerie to get another shot at its neck.

Three shots from Fenton at the ghost's legs and two from Valerie at the back of its neck had the cretaceous turtle retracting into its shell. Fenton started running and Valerie pulled out her Thermos before realizing why: the turtle was floating now, and it had begun to spin vertically. Ignoring the Red Huntress entirely, the turtle thing rolled after Danny as though he were the most important meal in the world. Spikes tore up sidewalk and pavement as Fenton booked it faster than Val had ever seen him run - had thought him capable of running - and she pushed the speed limit on her board.

* * *

 

Somewhere in the Spirit World, the sound of metal striking metal could be heard, a steady rhythm the inhabitants of the red mountain had grown used to. Inside, a green ghost who stood at eleven feet tall hunched over an anvil, green and red flames burning away in a furnace, not too far from him. At one wall sat a metal table upon which several blocks of ore - all glowing various colors and intensities - laid in a semi-organized fashion. Upon the anvil, being struck by the hammer of Svart Smith, one of the best-known blacksmiths in the Spirit World, was a white hot piece of metal. Currently, it was indistinguishable from any other curved metal, hot from the furnace fed naturally by the flames within the mountain, but that could have been said of the other pieces of metal work that had been lain out on yet another table. There were gauntlets and boots made of metals of the purest black, darker than the void of space, resting on the metal of the table, intricate symbols twisting along them in hypnotic patterns most would find useless or wasted on armor but were truly meant to serve a purpose in battle.

Svart had heard the news of the Spirit World, of the supposed prince who had saved them all from a return of Pariah's tyranny. Those who believed, those who knew the old laws and knew it to be true, had long pondered on how they would get into the good graces of this new potential king. Svart knew of one sure way to do this, to give the boy something that he could use. So, he forged on, determined to play his part in the reign of Phantom, however short it may be.

* * *

 

Faintly, Danny wondered if Fate was conspiring against him. Not only had he been stripped of his ghost powers, but Valerie had seen wimpy Fenton fighting a twenty-foot tall ghost. For an extra helping of Murphy's law, her idea to keep him relatively safe was to grab him as he dove behind a wall and place the shorter teen on her hover board as she looked for weak spots.

When it stopped, one obvious weak spot Val seemed to be overlooking was the exposed tail. Danny cranked up the wrist ray's intensity, took aim at the base and fired, grinning when he saw a burn mark left in the beam's wake. Shifting his weight a bit unsteadily, the raven haired teen waited for their target to come flying toward them and shot at the base of one of the spikes, grinning when he heard a roar of outrage.

"Aim for the base of the spikes! Hit them as hard as you can and knock a few of em off!" Even if Valerie knew he was smarter than he let on in class, that knowledge would be something only the Red Huntress knew of, not Valerie Gray. She'd have to reveal her secret to him to confront him about it any time besides now. "When it shows it's head, I'll fire at its neck, you get the tail and then suck it into the thermos!"

The huntress nodded and aimed her weapons at the spikes of the ghost, firing off when it slowed down or stopped to change direction. With their lesser size came greater mobility which Valerie used to her advantage and forced the turtle to stop in order to aim itself at the pair. She noted that Fenton didn't fire until it had stopped completely, likely because of the power levels of the wrist ray he was using and his aim. Then again, considering he hadn't missed a single shot so far, she questioned just what she knew about Danny Fenton.

After several minutes, a spike came flying off, landing somewhere in the streets below and scaring the lights out of some poor pedestrian. Then another, and another, landing on rooftops and in alleyways. Once the sixth spike came off, the turtle poked it's head out and started spitting jets of water from its mouth at the young ghost hunters.

In a moment of truly spectacular judgment, Danny ramped the wrist-ray to its highest setting and held up three fingers in front of Valerie's helmet before jumping off of her hoverboard, somehow managing to land on the turtle's head. He aimed at the exposed neck flesh and fired off a bright green burst of energy, earning a roar of pain from the creature below him. At the same time, a barrage of purple energy balls collided with its tail and the turtle rolled up into a ball again, Danny jumping off at the last second and grabbed her thermos as the huntress caught him. With practiced ease, he captured the ghost just as it spun towards them for another spiked charge and capped the capture device with a satisfied grin.

Once they had leveled out in the air, Danny let out a small huff of air, holding a bit tighter to the Huntress when he noted that they were still pretty high up in the sky. "Well, that was awesome," he managed to say after several beats of awkward silence. "But I do believe that my parents are wondering where I am, and they'll be pretty miffed when they find out that I ended up all the way in elmerton without telling them, so if you could drop me off in Amity Park or even just around here, I would very much appreciate that."

Instead of complying with his request, Valerie tried to organize her thoughts. Danny Fenton had just helped her kick ghost ass. The ass of a rather large ghost at that. With no problem other than that reckless stunt he pulled at the end of it all. "Look, kid," she started after a moment more of thought, "I appreciate the help, but I think I need some answers. You've never shown any kind of skill like that before."

"Well, that's rude," Danny scoffed and folded his arms. "I have plenty of skill, I'm one of the best DOOMED players I know." The snark didn't seem to amuse the Huntress at all. "I honestly don't know what you mean, anyone could have done all of that."  _ Note to self: lie better. _ Anyone with ghost hunter training and experience in the field could do what he did, sure, but that technicality wouldn't sell his case just because it made his statement true.

"Uh huh… and get their leg cut up in the process," Val gestured to the tear in Danny's jeans, which was showing off a bleeding - if shallow - wound that he had yet to realize was there. "Most people don't have the pain tolerance to ignore something like that. I'll fix you up," she turned her board in the direction of her warehouse base. "Cause that's probably only the most noticeable thing that happened to you in that fight and I'm not letting you walk home with a big gash in your leg if I can help it."  Ignoring any sounds of protest and sarcasm coming from her passenger, Valerie took off with questions racing through her head.

* * *

 

It took him a while, but Danny was determined to get to the Citadel of Time before going back to merge with his human half. As he approached the floating tower, surrounded by gears suspended in an eternal time loop, the prince rapped his knuckles against the door and raised a brow when it opened itself. Gliding through the corridors lined with all manners of clocks, each ticking pleasantly at their own pace and tracking time in some other dimension or timeline or planet, Danny noticed a sort of emptiness within the Citadel. Normally he could feel the presence of a spirit as powerful as clockwork the second he entered the timekeeper's lair, but now he felt nothing.

When he reached the room he had met up with Clockwork both times before - the observatory room - he glanced around at the mirrors suspended on one wall that displayed the passage of time in all directions possible. Once the flashes of past present and future, all as real as they were not, got too intense for Danny's mind to process, he looked around the room and found that Clockwork was still  _ not there _ . Lovely.

A piece of paper landed on his face and the ghost boy flailed wildly before snatching it off of his face. " _ Daniel, there is something incredibly urgent going on and I cannot come to speak with you when you need me to. However, I do have the time to leave this note and tell you, yes, you should tell Vlad of the future you experienced in our first meeting. I won't force you to do anything, but I feel you should have done this immediately after learning of his ability to change. _

_ Just like you, Daniel, Vlad has every right to be informed of what the future could hold for him should he not ignore and force out his inner demons. He deserves to know. Your plan to make a Deal with him does make sense, and I wish the best of luck to you, should you choose to go through with it. Below is a little tip to help you out with remerging with your other half. Now shoo before Citadel makes you shoo. _ Pfft," Danny scoffed at the last statement. "The Citadel loves me, they wouldn't make me shoo."

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Danny found himself outside of the Citadel, covered in glitter. Letting out a huff, he scowled at the building and flew back toward the library. "Guess I know what I need to do this week… Sam, Tuck, how's that whole 'Rescue Danny Fenton' thing going along?"

In his ear, static could be heard before the sound of an ecto blast going off filled his hearing and after a moment of checking to make sure that the dodge he instinctively performed was entirely unwarranted, felt a sense of dread crawl up his spine. " _ It's going pretty ok in my opinion, _ " Tucker's voice called through the Fenton Phone before the halfa could ask what was happening. " _ A few vultures followed Val into her hide out and Skulker followed them, so we're giving her backup without being spotted, and Skulker is trying to kill your human half. _ "

" **_WHAT_ ** ?"

* * *

 

What did the Ancients have against him, Danny Fenton had to wonder. Valerie refused to let him walk home and risk getting his leg infected, which he could understand. Unfortunately, she was also asking questions like 'when did you get so athletic?' and 'did you always have muscle definition?' These questions were both irritating and difficult to talk around while someone is treating your wound. He almost welcomed the distraction provided by Vlad's precious flaming turkeys descending upon the teen ghost hunters. Danny grabbed one of the ectorifles Val had laying around her warehouse and jumped out of the way of one vulture's talons, shooting him out of the sky a moment later as the Huntress dealt with another. It should have been a quick fight.

The ancients were against him, however. Skulker fired off a missile as Sam and Tucker appeared and all hell broke loose. Valerie focused on Skulker, who was aiming at Danny while he took out the last of the vultures. Another missile forced him to duck behind some crates. Growling under his breath, Danny grabbed one of Val's grenades, made a mental note to recommend some organization with the deadly weapons powered by transdimensional energy, and tossed it at Skulker, surprising the self-proclaimed greatest Hunter by setting the explosive off with a shot from the ectorifle.

The force of the explosion flung the suit into a wall. Before he could recover from the shock of the attack, Valerie shot at his chest, busting a hole in it, while Danny shot the hinges of the neck for Skulker's armor. Before he could be fully forced from his suit of armor, the hunter phased through the wall, coaxing the Huntress out to pursue him. Taking advantage of Skulker's quick distraction, Danny ran over to his friends and grinned.

"Well, I didn't expect you guys to charge into the warehouse and grab me, but I'm glad you're here all the same."

"Danny, what's going on here? Why are you in Valerie's hide out?" Sam brandished her ectopistol and checked the charge on it as Tucker pulled out the lipstick laser. "I thought you were headed to her house and then straight to yours, not to her evil base of operations."

"Can't be evil since Val isn't evil, but I didn't exactly plan this detour." Danny shrugged and shot at one of the windows, climbing up the crates to get a good view from inside the warehouse and taking aim at Skulker. "A large ghost turtle crab thing attacked me and she tried savin me. We kicked it's crustaceous butt together and then she brought me here cause one of its spikes cut my leg." A shot out the window that missed by an inch, clipping the mecha's wings instead of his head. "This isn't made for sniping… an E31 rifle it looks like. I can still make the shot I think…"

"I can get a pretty good shot in with this lipstick," Tuck climbed a bit more discreetly onto one of the crates and fired off a shot of his own that managed to hit one of the exposed wires from the hole in Skulker's suit. "By the way, your other half finally woke up fifteen minutes ago. He's blue and it sounds like he sent Fright Knight out to find us and you so how about we wrap this up."

A final shot that hit Skulker's jet engine wing in the engine and a blast from Valerie had the headpiece flying off and Valerie sucked the frog sized ghost that squirmed out of the helmet into her thermos. When she flew back into her hideout, she was the only one there.


	23. Bad Sunday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jack reminds the audience that he is, and gets paid to be, a scientist and genius; this is the part with the actual diplomacy, i lied last chapter; I put danny in pain because who the hell doesn't these days? ALSO a glimpse into why amity isn't the most loving of the Fentons and their "No ghosts at all" policy

Dr. Jackson William Fenton was a man of science. When he found himself without immediate words in response to his daughter's tirade, he was befuddled. How Jazz could simply ignore all of the proof they had compiled and shown to her and Danny since the portal got up and running, he had no idea, but she was calling the kettle black when saying he and Mads were being unscientific.

Once she had stormed off, he rushed over to the computer while Maddie went upstairs. "Jazz, sweetie, calm down and let's talk this out rationally."

"You've proven to me over the years that you don't know  _ how _ to be rational when it comes…" the voices faded away as he opened up the folders of research on ghosts they had.

"Where are those notes on our theory about Ghost's being sub-sentient?" With a speed that would confound anyone who hadn't seen him type before, Jack combed through his files and found only records on newspaper clippings about the box ghost and the ghost that was always chasing after Phantom.

Deciding to check for the file later, he closed out and flicked through more, changing his search a bit. "Hypothesis ghost boy Invisobill has heroic obsession…" they had figured out its obsession thanks to the constant insistence that it was the good guy. Phantom also pandered to its fans quite a bit. "Would make sense for Invisobill to feed off the positive energy generated by heroics…where is that darned data?" he made a note to himself to update the files and rename subject 0014 as Phantom instead of Invisobill and scratched his head absently as he searched for the data.

"Displays of hostility towards humanity clear in its actions towards humans when not engaged in combat with other ghosts… subject seeks out other ghosts to cause chaos in battle…" all that came up were recordings they had gotten of the GIW going after Phantom along with the other ghost hunters, and destroying a wire filled red huntress suit - which had led the couple to believe someone was making remote control robots to go after the ghost boy- along with articles on declining property damage in Amity over recent months.

The lack of proper notes and data astounded Jack, but also got him feeling rather serious. For the next twenty minutes, he was staring at a bright green screen, racing through folders and files. "Ectoplasm's reaction with living world," "Bonding Ecto-energy with real-world items for weaponry," "Conversion of ectoplasmic energy into electrical energy." Nothing but facts on ectoplasm. Where were the facts about ghosts only feeling remembered simulations of pain? Where were the observations of Phantom consistently sticking around long enough to soak up the attention and positive emotion from its fans? He stopped at the last file "Weaponizing Ectoplasm." No data on sub-sentient ghosts.

Never had he truly questioned whether or not he was right about ghosts being evil. As much as it pained him to say it in this instance, Jazz was right, they had no way of knowing for sure whether or not ghosts were all evil. They were being biased. How had he and Maddie become so blind and unscientific in this quest for recognition?

As he asked himself this question, cleaning an ecto rifle in the lab, the doors to the portal opened. His immediate thought was to check the system for whatever glitch allowed that to happen, but then the ghost alarms blared as a ghost flew out of the portal. Jack held an ecto pistol at his side, but for once in his life, he didn't fire on sight.

The ghost was a young man with stubble and short bangs that looked ridiculous to the elder man. His pale face was rounded like he hadn't yet grown out of baby fat before passing and his bright orange shirt clashed with the dark brown coat and jeans. He looked so young, but it was just a ghost, Jack reminded himself. Its skin was a shade of green so bright, he stuck out like a piece of broccoli on a plate of candy. When it walked towards the stairs, it seemed to finally notice the giant in the corner wearing the orange hazmat suit and flew up towards the ceiling as fast as it could go.

Jack dashed to the Fenton escape tunnel and started up the Specter Speedster, activating the cloaking device he had installed just last week and raced out of the tunnel. Jackson William Fenton was a scientist, and it was high time for some observation.

* * *

 

When Danny had finished telling his friends about his fight with the ghost turtle on their way to Amity, he paused and facepalmed. "Wow, no wonder I'm only a C student: I should have thought of this ages ago." Rounding a corner and heading into an alleyway, Danny waited for his friends to be by his side before calling out in as commanding a tone as he could muster "Fright Knight, come to me!"

When nothing happened, Tucker patted his friend's back and pulled out his phone. "We're near Amity so I should be able to ping any ectosignatures near our position." Before the geek could do anything more, a bright green vortex of light appeared at the end of the alleyway.

"That was fast," Sam noted.

A giant scythe-like appendage reached out of it, missing Sam by an inch. "Or not." The trio of ghost hunters formed as wide a triangle in the space they had as possible, ecto pistols and saber primed and ready for a fight. A praying mantis the size of the buildings they were all wedged between stalked out of the portal with a screech that had Tucker reaching up to cover one of his ears.

"Tuck get the legs, Sam those sharp arm things - don't give me that look," Danny scowled at the disapproving look the goth was giving him as he aimed for one of the eyes on the insect. "Just cut them off, and I'll take the eyes."

"That's a bit harsh don't you think Danny?" Sam ducked a swipe of the scythe-like arm and raised her saber to cut through the exoskeleton of the mantis when bright green steel rose through the thorax of the bug and it vanished in a cloud of smoke. When the smoke dissipated, the Fright Knight was sitting atop Nightmare, menacing emerald gaze fixed on the three teens. "I guess it's not."

"Fright Knight. Good to see you," Danny powered down his wrist ray with a relaxing breath. "You have pretty good timing, Fright. Is that something to do with being a knight? You know when I'm in trouble or something?"

"Something like that, Hunter Fenton." The knight nodded and held a hand out to the portal behind him, the radioactive green shifting to an almost black purple. "My prince has ordered me to bring all three of you to the Ghostwriter's library. We should make haste." When Danny walked over and offered to let his friends onto Nightmare first, she snorted threateningly, and Fright shook his head. "Apologies, Hunter, but Nightmare shant allow any but a royal spirit or ghost to ride her." Noting the change in addressing, a puzzled frown marred the ghost hunter's features.

"Why the sudden change to Hunter instead of Prince?" Tucker raised a brow, his ecto pistol still primed in case the spirit tried anything fishy.

Fright waved a hand coated in violet flame over Danny's head, the teen's chest giving off the faintest of blue light, almost invisible in the daylight. "Though you retain some small fragment of your ghostly core, you are no longer the prince himself, but the human hunter he originated as." The glow faded and the Knight extinguished the flames. "Thus, Nightmare shall not let you ride her." The unspoken 'you're just an assignment right now' was clear in the knight's tone.

Turning to his friends, Danny sighed. "You guys remember how to direct yourselves through the Zone, right?" They had experimented, once, with the idea that if humans were like ghosts when in the Ghost Zone. So, they tried to see if Sam and Tucker could do anything in the Zone that Danny could do in the Human World. Apparently, they could at least fly and phase through ectoplasmic matter, but they couldn't turn themselves invisible.

"Yeah, Danny, we can manage." Tucker nodded and adjusted his grip on the suitcase he still had with him. He hadn't had any time to waste on putting it back home. "I'm good to go."

"Ready when you are Danny." Sam put her pistol back into the strap hidden under the back of her shirt. "All of our weapons should recharge while we're in the Zone thanks to the ambient ectoplasm."

Nodding, Danny turned towards the portal with a look of relief. "Alright Fright, let's go. I wanna get back to being whole as soon as possible, it's weird not having my spirit powers."

When the vortex closed, one ginger rounded the corner with a camera and a wicked grin on his face. "Gotcha, this time, Phantom."

* * *

 

When Phantom returned to the library, it was with a grin plastered on his face and a bright green puppy in his arms. "Um, Ghost Writer? If you please what is your policy on pets in the library? A certain friend of mine followed me home and I should be a cur to leave him out in the void." The prince paused and laughed as Cujo licked his face for the tenth time since he had collided with the ghost boy on his way back to Vydia. "I promise he shall only slobber on me."

"So long as he doesn't destroy any of my books, Phantom," the writer appeared next to the prince, several books wrapped in purple auras near identical to the Ghostwriter's own floated around the ghost, flipping through themselves seemingly at random before closing and heading back to their shelves. "You of all people know what will happen if one of my books gets ruined."

"You'll teach the puppy a life lesson?" Danny raised a brow, scratching behind Cujo's ear. Setting the guard dog down, Danny looked straight into Cujo's eyes as he spoke. "Now Cujo, you must be good and keep your distance from the books floating around the place, ok? Do well and we shall go adventuring later." Cujo yapped at him and nodded, running around to sniff at the other ghosts around the library. "I take it the others have yet to return since I haven't been punched by Sam yet."

"No, but I'm sure that they're on their way." The writer hummed in thought before setting his books on a table. "Phantom, there's something that I wanted to discuss with you." the prince turned his full attention to the writer and stood tall even though the elder ghost had half a foot on him. "I realize that you have grown into quite the warrior since we first met and that your experience in battle shall aid you in trials to come." Here, Phantom quirked a brow but remained silent. "However, I feel that it would benefit your future rule as King if you employed a bit of diplomacy with your subjects before they know that you're in charge of them."

"How do you mean, pray tell?" There was no small amount of interest in the prince's weary voice. Ancients knew he could use any diplomatic advice he could get.

"You've encountered ghosts in the Human World who were non-violent and simply had things they wanted to do, such as visit family or watch over an area, qui?" A nod from Phantom and a smile spread over Ghost Writer's face. "As you had no reason to attack them, you have formed a truce of sorts with ghosts that are peaceful and pose no threat to humans. So, why not propose a truce among the ghosts that you know personally and reduce the amount of enemies that you have to deal with?"

Phantom tilted his head and thought about it for a moment before nodding, a smile spreading across his features as well. "I like the way you think Ghostwriter. That shall reduce the collateral damage in Amity, and I might well establish a peace between the Spirit World and the Human World. My thanks." Holding out his hand, the prince turned as soon as the librarian had shaken it. "Elle has returned. If you please to inform her of the plan whilst I propose the truce?"

Danny flew up and toward the center of the library, sending out a clone or two to gather the occupants thereof in the air that he was occupying. When everyone was there, he waved and smiled. "Greetings all, at least five of you know of me, since I can pick out Johnny, Kitty, Ember, Amorpho and Lunch Lady. To those of you who do not, I am Danny Phantom." As he had expected, there were a few gasps and murmurs at the halfa's new appearance. "All those of you who know me personally, know fighting can be less than advantageous to you in an environment I know as well as my hometown," Danny grinned at the cringes that he saw on the faces of Johnny and Ember before schooling his expression. "However, I have no desire to fight you all. Everyone here is—" he just stopped himself from saying 'my subjects', "—no more deserving of battery than any human. I know it hurts when I hit you and I don't really want to hurt anyone."

"Which is why I'm proposing a truce. As a half ghost, I can be a representative of the Earth." Phantom paused, glancing over to where he saw his sister, a small smile forming where a frown had been. "Not all humans are bad, nor are all ghosts. I seek to prove that to both species. The truce is rather simple. Ghosts agree to stop terrorizing the Earth and find some constructive ways to fulfill your obsessions. In exchange, I won't attack you unless you're endangering a life, and I shall defend you from ghost hunters like the Fentons, the Red Huntress and the Guys in White."

Murmurs rose around the library and there seemed to be a slightly mixed mood around the crowd of ghosts in the building. "Please, you need not agree just yet, but ponder it at least. And if you could, spread the word so that everyone knows." Sensing Fright nearing the library, Phantom tilted his head and added, "If the worst behaviors are stopped, the way is cleared for people who want to see their families, and the humans will turn to your side instead of the hunters who would murder even the peaceful spirits." Turning invisible, the prince floated over to the entrance and waved when Elle flew next to him not a moment later.

* * *

 

A part of science was being wrong about something. Realizing you were wrong about something in your field of study signifies only an opportunity to learn more and correct your false belief. Jack Fenton was heavily reminded of this fact when he followed the young ghost to a house in the suburbs of Amity and saw it knock on the door of a house.

A preconceived notion Jack had bought into was ghosts saw no need or reason to knock or ask permission from anyone, even other ghosts, to do anything, let alone enter a dwelling. And yet here he was, watching a ghost wait for a human to bid him to enter. Was there some truth to the superstition of thresholds? There was no attack, no scream of terror or pain, no signs of malevolence. A woman appeared in the doorway and the two embraced as though the ghost were still flesh and blood. Jack waited in the GAV, camouflaged thanks to the latest upgrade, instinctively wary of any form of aggression from the ghost. Tapping a few keys on the control panel of the GAV, he turned on the audio surveillance equipment he and Maddie had installed.

"...ong, I think the ghost hunter guy that saw me come out of the portal is still looking for me and I don't want him breaking into the house." That was the ghost's voice, only a few octaves lower than Danny's. He- it - looked around in suspicion, pulling away from the blonde woman with reluctance. "But I really wanted to see you and when I heard Phantom was only fighting violent ghosts I couldn't stay in that place anymore."

"Oh, Dean, you're back. You're back." The woman touched the ghost as though she'd never seen one before. She pulled the ghost inside and closed the door. Luckily for Jack's field observation - it wasn't just some invasion of privacy, he was a scientist and this was his best opportunity – the audio surveillance still picked up every word, if a bit muffled. "After seven years, I thought I'd lost you forever…"

"You don't mind that I'm…" a pause, "Green?"

"As though I would care about color. I didn't dare hope, even for a chance to say goodbye. This is a miracle!"

"Not according to the ghost hunters. You know I," another pause, was his machine malfunctioning? Jack briefly flipped the cover open, looking at the inner guts of the audio surveillance. "I can't stay forever. The ghost hunters—"

"Won't get you here!" Jack, in the middle of adjusting the volume on his audio surveillance, jerked back in shock at the loud, feral voice. He'd heard it from himself once when the Wisconsin Ghost dared threaten his family. His children. It was a tone born from berserk-button rage. "They won't. I'll turn them into ghosts first."

A fond sigh, "You can't protect me from all of them," the ghost explained. "The Guys in White are federal agents. You'll go to jail for shooting them."

"I don't care. Seven years…you died too young. You didn't even graduate high school!" Jack shifted uncomfortably, remembering vividly one of Jazz's lectures on the vulnerability of high school students. How likely they were to die by car crash, by suicide, by homicide, by drug overdose, by accident…

…not to mention by ghosts themselves. That was why Jack spied on ghosts. Why he and his wife hunted them. With renewed determination he sat down and listened.

"What about Sam and Cassie? They need you and you can't help from a jail cell. Besides, it's not so bad in the ghost zone…"

"I don't care if it's heaven; you were taken too soon, sweetie. A parent shouldn't have to bury their child, Dean."

Parent?

Child?

Oh. Jack's pen froze over his scribbled observations in mid-sentence; he sat up and stared at the house as realization set in.

Was the ghost her son? Of course, the ghost was her son; no wonder people thought he was thick. And no wonder they shunned him and Maddie for hunting ghosts.

"I can't stay long. The Fentons have ghost trackers. I heard rumors the Red Huntress does too and the GIW might too. They'll find me here. You'll get in trouble and I…I've heard stories…of what they do to ghosts."

Teenagers die so easily. He thought of Jazz, careful and conscious of her mortality except when it came to ghosts, of Danny who skipped curfew too many times and came back with far too many ill-hidden bruises for comfort. But his children would never come back as ghosts.

"They won't, you're my son."

"They'd rip open anyone's dead son," the ghost said bitterly.

Briefly, from the darkest corners of his imagination rose a vision of Danny's ghost pinned onto a lab table, dissected and crying out for mercy…

NO!

Cold sweat drenched his face like ice-water. Jack shook his head to banish the nightmare from his mind. No, he would recognize a Danny-ghost anyway. Even he wasn't that oblivious. Neither was Maddie.

"At least give me a chance to say goodbye."

Jack turned his machine off with trembling hands, unable to hear any more. He didn't want to hear about children dying before their time. He didn't want to think about children becoming ghosts. Not even for science could he bring himself to turn it on again.

* * *

 

As the trio of hunters and Fright came upon the library, another Danny appeared before them, this one with a lightning scar and bright blue skin. Before Tucker could quip about his turtleneck, Phantom reached a hand out to all of them, encasing them in an icy blue light before snapping his fingers. Blue filled everyone's vision as they were teleported to a room filled with tables, shelves and counters covered in books, scrolls, chalk circles, or test tubes. That was all they took in of the room before noting a human Elle drawing symbols at the edges of a circle the Ghostwriter was floating above - his eyes flicking between a sheet of paper and a glowing blue book levitating before him. One Elle, Phantom, set down a candle on top of each symbol her human half drew, and once the fifth and last one was set down, the elder Phantom flicked his hand and they were lit with green flames.

Fenton and friends stared numbly for a moment before Tucker pulled out his phone and snapped a few pictures. "I take it this is your crazy alchemy lab?"

"That it is," The writer nodded, flipping a page and studying it closely. "And if you're wondering why Elle is currently in two separate bodies instead of one, there's a perfectly logical reason for that." He gestured broadly in the direction of the Fenton Ghostcatcher, which stood next to one of the support columns.

Just as the purple-clad ghost opened his mouth to continue speaking, both Elle's interrupted with a jubilant "FOR SCIENCE!" Ghostwriter sighed and nodded, a flick of his hand wiping away what Tucker could only describe as squiggles made in chalk, new ones replacing them. "Just because it started with magic doesn't mean it's not science related!"

"Ghostwriter pulled up the Ghostcatcher with his power and used a spell to separate Elle," Danny's spirit half cut in, taking in the appearance of his human self. "We tried using the ghost catcher to fuse them back together, but apparently human science is still too far behind to reverse the effects of spiritual magic."

"You got really good with that teleportation of yours in, what, twenty minutes?" The raven haired hunter gestured to Fright Knight - though he was more focused on Nightmare. "How did you do that?"

"Pure luck, I assure you." Phantom shrugged and Elle rolled her eyes, while her Phantom side picked up the human girl and flew through the Ghostcatcher, merging together. "However, magic can undo what science does. After putting them back together, we had Elle go through the Ghostcatcher. So, it looks like we're kinda stuck performing a ritual that CW gave me the instructions for."

"They would have the information for something like this," Danny snorted, rolled his eyes and walked over to inspect the circle. "Gods, this looks old, it has to be them. On that note, did you ask about the other thing?"

"They left a note regarding some manner of monster with similar powers to be dealt with." Phantom floated closer to his friends and plucked Tucker's hat from his head, rising out of reach with a grin. "Which is something future Danny shall have to deal with."

"Danny," Sam cut in with a raised brow, a raven crafted from metal as black as Fright Knight's armor having been placed in her hand by Elle. "Do you talk to yourself often? Or is this something you practiced when you started ranting to pigeons?" Both Dannys leveled a flat look at their gothic friend, trying to ignore their laughing sister. "Because this doesn't seem all that odd to you."

"He's had to deal with being split in two before, Sam." Tucker paused in his attempts to grab his hat to accept a yellow crystal with green lines woven through the surface and core of the shining rock from Ghostwriter, who was now grasping him with telekinesis and placing him down on one of the circled symbols. "And this isn't the worst he's had to deal with either. I'd say we're at the part where things are dangerous but calm at the same time." Ignoring the snort that his comment earned from the writer, the geek checked his watch. "Yup, it's about time for that."

"Can you take this a bit more seriously, Tucker?" Sam was also placed on top of a symbol, and she watched as the librarian ghost handed an ankh of forest green metal to Elle, whom obviously knew some of what was going on as she stood over a symbol without prompt. "The moment you just mentioned is usually when bad things happen, and I don't feel like getting jinxed again, bad luck Tuck."

"That was all Johnny and you know it!" The teen glared at the vegan, looking ready to throw whatever artifact he had been given at her. "And would anyone mind explaining why Ghostwriter is putting a mirror and an owl on top of those circles?" A mirror had been placed in a way that held it upright and facing the center of the circle, and an owl carved intricately from what looked almost like silver was in its own place. "I don't like being forced into ghost shit without at least knowing what you're doing with me."

"Cosmic circuit board," the writer spoke up as he gestured to the Danny twins, Phantom tossing Tucker's hat back onto his head and lifting his other half over the chalk so as to not disturb it. "You all are specified in this note from whoever this CW is that Phantom visited." Ghostwriter backed up beyond the edge of the outer circles and motioned with his index finger, a piece of chalk placing a final circle around the outer five. "The process shouldn't hurt you, and if it does it'll only sting a tiny bit - and yes I do remember what it means to humans when pain is minimal."

The spellcasting book ghost looked over the note Phantom had brought back once more before dipping a brush in a bowl, the paint-like liquid a metallic gray, and marked both Fenton and Phantom on the cheek. For the Hunter, a dot surrounded by curved lines resembling a sun symbol he'd seen as a child. Upon the Prince went a crescent moon more white than gray against the pale blue skin of the ice core. "I do require your voices for this joining of two mistakenly separated beings, but only for one phrase."

A few strokes of his brush and a flick of the ghost's hand and Latin words floated before all those involved in the ritual besides the Dannys in the center of the circle, standing above their symbol face to face. "This isn't a language that originated on earth, so give those words a few tries."

"Duos erunt kaj unu du?" Elle twisted that sentence around in her head a few times, searching through anything she had read or heard that might be similar. "That feels weird to say."

"It sounds like Esperanto," Tucker looked over the words in front of him several times while Sam muttered to herself before speaking up again. "But it also sounds like Latin?"

"Tis neither," Phantom shook his head, looking at the characters written in the air and the writer that was jotting down notes in a leather-bound book. "It has an Alomoran look but of the meaning I know nothing."

"We've never seen Alomoran text before." Fenton's eyes kept switching between the ever patient book ghost, and the black-clad warrior inspecting the room around them. "And also, I call bullshit on this not hurting." Danny knew all too well, both in spirit and as a human being, that pulling the two of them together would be far from painless.

The writer looked up from what Phantom assumed to be his journal and nodded. "Oh no, I meant that it wouldn't hurt anyone in the outer circles. We'll be disassembling your molecules and putting them back together. Don't give me that look; I didn't come up with the ritual or think of it as the way to do this." Everyone but Fright Knight and the Dannys glared at the purple-clad ghost, and he snorted at the hidden threats in their gazes. "I could take all of you but the Fright Knight on in my sleep, and I'm here to help you. Now, I believe it's been a sufficient amount of time for memorization, qui?"

Several irate nods prompted the writer to gather energy in his hands. "Join hands and we shall speak as one, to bring Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom together once more." Checking to make sure there was enough room to do so without disrupting the circle, everyone held hands, Phantom and Fenton included.

Ghostwriter began speaking in Alomoran, and to his great surprise, Phantom was able to understand snippets of the language. The lines of chalk began to glow as the writer spoke of the Spirit Mother and the gateway between worlds. Energy surged into the items held and floating, and Fenton and Phantom's big mouths ran at once. "Honestly, you'd think magic could stand to be a bit less flaaaAAAAAAAAAAA!" A scream came from the two, easily ignored at first, but soon not.

Elle and Ghostwriter's voices echoed more noticeably than normal when the words that they were to speak as one came. " _ Et erunt duo in carne una vice! _ "

Two screams merged into one, echoing and haunting and causing the blood to run cold in Tucker and Sam's veins as memories from The Day came flooding back, grips tightening.

Elle froze deathly still, every muscle clenched with horror at the sound of pure agony that called on her every instinct to run in, stop this madness and save him, save her brother - but she couldn't. She knew logically if she did it would only break the ritual and her brother had been torn apart by the last ritual disruption. But her whole body boiled, adrenaline flooding her veins with the need to _do something._ The knowledge that she was doing all she could, that it wasn't enough, made her feel colder than Danny's ice.

The energy surged from their items to the circle and into the symbols of the two halves of Danny. The power spread from the symbols and words no one ever thought they'd hear from Danny filled the room. "Make it stop make it stop, it burns," he thrashed, trying to escape the burning in his heart, blood, lungs, " _ Make it stop, make it stop make the burning stop make it stop P̕l͝eas͝e I Don't Want To Ḑ̶̶i̸e Again! _ " Sam's face went a paler white than Danny's hair as a spirit, Tucker looked as green as he had when Desiree gave him power, and Elle felt tears falling down her cheeks as the urge to faint found its way into her mind.

Ghostwriter's immobile features cringed slightly when the more coherent screams began and a shiver from the otherworldly - more so than anything he had heard in the spirit world - undertones. Such cries had become too familiar to him in his life on earth for it to have any effect now.

The Fright Knight, native to the Spirit World, he who sent ghosts and humans alike to their never ending nightmares, showed not an ounce of sympathy for his prince. Emerald eyes narrowed in the direction of the Ghostwriter, and he gripped the handle of SoulShredder, but stayed his hand. It would do him no good to attack the writer, even if something in the back of his mind said he must. Instead, he resigned himself to waiting for the blinding light that now blanketed the room to subside, emotionless face hidden behind his helmet.

Sam and Tucker, however, could hear the scream long after it had ended, the sound of their best friend dying, twice over, ringing in their heads like the tolling of a funeral bell.

The light died. The room's illumination faded away to the soft glow of Danny's aura. A tan-skinned ghost boy stood in the center of the circle, still wearing the outfit provided by the Ghostwriter. The halfa fell to his knees, head bowed for a moment before he looked up, bright green irises and pale blue sclera alight with all things Danny staring into the faces of his closest friends. "Hey guys, guess who's back."

* * *

 

Within Vlad Master's vault lay lie many things that would have a ghost hunter or spiritualist salivating, the power held within some of the stolen objects hitting his sixth sense immediately upon opening the vault door. It was a set of these artifacts he now sought.

Striding with purpose and murderous rage, the billionaire reached a glass case holding a set of armor, red and white, complete with a sheathed blade, all cloaked in an ethereal glow casting the bunker-like vault in a ghostly light that provided no need of artificial illumination. Reaching into the case, Vlad pulled out the sword and drew it from the sheath, revealing a pale white blade with a line of crimson cut through it, as though it were bleeding.

After a few test swings of his sword, Vlad was satisfied with his form and speed and sheathed the blade. "Tomorrow, the Fright Knight dies." Satisfied, the mastermind millionaire pulled out his cell phone. He had a call to make, and chaos to unleash.


	24. Bad Monday Mood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ok so, the question of what core is Elle is answered, Danny tests out using the things he gets in Deals, Jack can cook, and then Shit Happens.  
> or rather, hits the fan

When Elle had woken up, she was slightly surprised to see that the Ghostwriter wasn't at all awake. Well, that was a bit inaccurate. It was far easier to assume him to be dead with how he was acting. Following the book loving ghost, Elle was lead into a small kitchen, something that greatly shocked her. "Ghosts eat?"

"When we are hurt it helps to do so or risk core exhaustion," the writer explained, only after pouring a cup of ready coffee and drinking half of his mug. "And if we don't eat, we begin to feel weak and must rely solely on our core element and obsession for sustenance. The reason why the Box Ghost is so weak is that he does not eat often, and thus his inflow of energy - ectoplasmic or otherwise - is low."

After a quick breakfast - eggs, sausages and pancakes that had the teen wondering why he wasn't a chef - Elle flew off into the zone and found her way to Mokuto's forest, landing on the bark of the closest tree this time. Tall, lanky and looking much like a tree with legs, Mokuto himself jumped down from one of the branches nearby. "Hello, Elle, a joy it is to see you again so soon."

"When I said that I wished to learn, I meant it." The ghost girl stood at attention for a moment, bowing to her waist. "It is an honor to be your student." A familiar laughter had the teen raising her head with a smile.

"As it is to teach you, young one. Now, taking into consideration who your brother is," he paused, lips curling into a smirk. "Don't look so surprised Elle, the forest holds many secrets, and news of a truce spreads rather quickly. Considering who your brother is and the fact that you're now where he can more easily find you, I know of something that you should learn quickly. However, there is something that I need to test if you would allow me?"

"As long as you aren't trying to kill or hurt me, I'm good." she nodded, raising a brow in curiosity. "What exactly are you testing?"

"I have an idea of what kind of core you have, and I'd like to check and see." The tree like spirit - rather similar to what humans wrote dryads to look like, the teen absently noted - walked behind her and placed the tips of two fingers at the back of Elle's neck. Tendrils of green energy spread from his fingertips and into her nape.

What Elle felt was a rush of power the likes she had never experienced before. Energy flowed from her neck down to her very core, the pulsations having never felt so intense in all her short life. A presence filled with strength and patience probed at her consciousness for a moment before retreating.

Mokuto pulled his hand back and positioned himself in front of his student, a smile plastered onto his face. "Elle, this is amazing! I've not seen a life core outside of the forest in decades!"

"A life core?" the halfa held her head in one hand, the other braced against the trunk of the tree, dizziness washing over her. "What's that mean, exactly? I know that my brother is a cold core but beyond that, nada."

Mokuto chuckled and placed a hand on the branch beneath them, effervescent green light flowing over the bark. Radiant flowers rose up from the tree branch, bringing a smile to Elle's face. "Life cores have the power to alter the flow of energy around them and are the greatest healers. This is especially good for the lesson I have prepared for you today." rising to his full height, mokuto turned inward towards the forest and got ready to jump. "When you are ready."

Shaking off the last of her dizziness, the ghost girl nodded and crouched as well. "Let's go!"

* * *

 

When Danny woke up, things seemed ok. None of his usual ghostly foes had come through the portal to disrupt his sleep, he wasn't covered in ectoplasmic goo, and he actually felt rested for once. After getting clean and pulling on some jeans, a blue shirt and his sneakers, the halfa paused in thought. With a bit of concentration, frost covered his arms and back before falling away to reveal the letter jacket that Kwan had traded him. Pulling it off, he found Kwan's name and phased it off, covering the letters in frost and watching as it fell between his fingers. "This actually feels comfy…"

Leaving the jacket open, Danny opened his door and was smacked in the face with the scent of food. Good food, which meant that something was up. Even with his 'healthy paranoia', as he justified it to be to Jazz, the scent of bacon, cinnamon, and freshly baked dough made the teen's mouth water as he headed down the stairs. He quirked a brow at the sight of his father scrapping eggs out of a pan onto four plates, bacon already placed. There were even cinnamon rolls on the counter. "...Dad? Where's mom and why are you making breakfast?" Danny couldn't remember the last time his father cooked, or even whether or not the man knew how to do so without burning something.

Jack turned to his son with a raised brow and chuckled as boisterously as ever. "You know, I  _ do _ know how to cook, Danno. Sometimes you've gotta get your mind off everything by doing something you don't usually do." Furrowing his brow- which didn't distract from the bags under his eyes, darker than they were after the usual all-nighters he pulled when inspiration struck - the scientist turned toward the clock on the wall before turning back to Danny. "You're up early."

"I'm up on time, you mean," the raven haired teen chuckled and sat down. "Ok, so you're cooking and Mom is doing what?" Seeing as he had everything done and got up on time, he felt able to enjoy his breakfast at the table for once. "I can't imagine there's much to do at six fifty in the morning." Besides make gravy, which Jack had apparently also done, as it was being poured on top of the man's eggs.

"She's doing yoga on the roof," Jack shook his head with a snort, "tried to convince me to go up and do it with her. My body does not stretch like that and she should know it…" Jack set the pan in the sink and turned to Danny. "How ya feelin son? Enjoy your weekend?"

Danny shrugged and thought over it for a moment. He obviously couldn't say that his clone returned from South America, they fought a giant lava spewing gorilla, he destroyed slew of GIW property, got split in half after being summoned by his loving parents, had to fight a giant turtle without his powers and on a board that was using a smaller version of their Gravity Inverters to hover and sneak away before he got caught in his web of secrets, negotiated a truce with the ghosts that terrorized the town in their pursuit of violently fulfilling their obsessions and released a reality bending ghost from ghost jail after asserting his authority as spirit royalty. His father would either think him crazy or believe him, and Danny wasn't sure which was a worse outcome.

So instead, he opted for a less worldview shattering answer. "Eh, it was ok. This jacket that I ordered from the school came in the mail, finally. What about you dad?"

"It was alright. Found some data need to go over with your mom…" jack thought back to the first ghost he didn't treat like a hostile and shook his head as he loaded two cinnamon rolls the size of Danny's hands onto their plates. "Jazzerincess pointed something out to us that we'll have to examine further."

When the food was set down, Danny dug in gratefully and nodded along as his father fell into the more familiar subject of mechanical engineering. It brought back thoughts of Valerie's board and he tilted his head mid explanation. "Hey, Dad?"

"Yeah, son?" It had become increasingly rare for his son to show any interest in what Jack was talking about at all, let alone participate in the conversation, this past year and Jack was happy to hear anything Danny had to add to his ramblings.

"If we still have the parts, do you think I can mess around with the design on the Gravity Inverter? Also, have you patented that?" The last part had come as an afterthought, but it was a valid question. As far as Danny knew, they paid the bills with a trust fund. "I wanna make something and I think that if you patent the design you can make a lot, enough for Jazz's college funds even."

Jack thought about the idea for a moment and nodded, swallowing his food. "I think we have enough parts left for three more inverters this month, and yes its patented but you make money on technology from licensing others to manufacture it, son, that's something we don't do." a look of consideration planted itself on Jack's face for all of a minute before he was reaching over, giving Danny a pat on the back - which was more like a light smack with Danny's smaller frame. "Think I might suggest we do that to Mads. Thanks, son, have fun in the lab today."

"Thanks, dad, I will." after finishing his food, Danny headed out the door, around the corner, and transformed to fly to school.

* * *

 

Rick never thought that he'd be reading first thing in the morning. Sure, he loved to learn new languages as much as the next guy, but sleep walking to the attic and waking up with a dimly glowing book under his head was not something that the boxer had expected to experience the day after he did some magic. "Who the hell put this here?" As he sat up, rubbing his head, Rick turned the book over in his hand. The violet leather felt entirely natural, other than the cold static that was its aura. There was no title, no marking, nothing to separate it from anything else. "Well, I don't remember anything written about Leuirath's purple books in the journals, and I don't know any ghosts personally…" unless he counted Danny, though he hardly counted.

As he headed downstairs to grab some food, the bespectacled teen leafed through the pages of the book and raised a brow upon finding a bookmarked page. " _ Demons are powerful and dangerous, to spirits as much as they are to humans. Just as humans can be possessed by a spirit or a ghost or demon, spirits can also be possessed by their own kind or by demons with stronger wills. _ Ok, this is something I'll be reading a lot of today." He had a feeling that this book hadn't shown up under his head by accident, since he would have noticed a glowing purple book on the shelves of his attic when he had gone up earlier last week. "I dunno how this got here, but I'm gonna put this to good use." If there was one thing he knew, it was that knowledge was power and ignorance vulnerability. Rick Pate was not one to leave himself or his brother vulnerable.

* * *

 

In the spirit world, there was one place that few dared to go. Vines crept out of holes in the walls and the ground, the walls of the structure were worn and cracked; pieces of the island fell away bit by bit, shrinking it slowly. The castle resting upon this decaying rock had been abandoned centuries ago, if not a millennia, and only recently had any come near it. At first, a boy had come into its halls with only the intention of raising his chances to win. The next time, a foolhardy old man had come to claim a power that was not his. Most recently, however, and with increasing frequency, one figure clad in armor as black as the void between the stars walked these ancient halls to the most dangerous place therein.

The key that he sought was in the hands of a being too powerful to confront, as the timekeeper would surely destroy him should he come near their dwelling. And so, the Knight had to free his king the hard way. With an ax that had been hung on the walls of the throne room, he struck against the carvings that held his King prisoner, cracks racing along the sarcophagus from each removed symbol. The sigils were powerful, the energies of the Ancients poured into each word, but only one line remained.

Fool spirits and coward ghosts had claimed his lord to be tainted by Demons. Fright knew better than that by far, but he was imprisoned before he could stop the magi from sealing his king away. Now, though, he would see Pariah freed eternally and his reign restored. After all of his work, there was only one line of sigils left to destroy, and the cracking sarcophagus would be destroyed forever.

In the nigh silent halls of the castle, a click that would have been imperceptibly quiet otherwise echoed off the walls, giving the Knight the only warning he needed to raise his sword and block a bullet made of pure white energy. Narrowing his eyes at the offending shooter, he saw a man with spiky white hair and bright blue eyes, a white trench coat held to his body by the gun holsters strapped to his waist, smirking at the spirit. "A peasant - a  _ ghost _ \- dares to attack the Fright Knight?"

Snorting at the way ghost was hissed, as though it were a slur against the deceased, the man pulled out a second pistol, spinning it by the trigger. "My employer says that he doesn't like traitors. You seem to be embodying that all around, and to be honest I actually agree with the vampiric douchebag." A flash of purple streaked past where the hired gun had been and the ghost appeared three feet to the left. "Betraying Pariah, betraying Plasmius, and now going behind Phantom's back to free Pariah again?" Another teleport and the ghost was behind the Knight, firing off a shot that was deflected an inch from his face. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you were planning on this the moment Plasmius proposed his Deal to you."

"So long as this damnable prison exists, my King shant be truly free. Once he has risen again, the sarcophagus will be destroyed and Pariah shall reign supreme for all eternity." The Knight's fist found purchase in the assassin's gut, sending him back into the wall next to the sarcophagus. "And all of you wretched ghosts shall be eliminated in the finalization of what was put on hold two thousand years ago."

The ghost laughed and dislodged himself from the red stone, dusting off his coat. "I must say, Spirit of Fear, that you are quite the warrior. However, a child was able to beat you before he had full control of his powers, I do believe that this will be over relatively quickly." Two quick shots and he was gone, another pair of ectobullets striking the knight's armor while he blocked the first shots. "The name of your executioner is Randall Riter." Soulshredder bit into a white bubble of energy, cracking it.  _ "This will be a fun fight, qui?" _

* * *

 

The day had been going smoothly for Danny Tucker and Sam so far. They had all turned in their English assignments on time for once, Danny got to show off his knowledge of science since he was more awake than usual, Dash hadn't even attempted to confront them once, and they had skillfully avoided the Pate twins up until lunch, which the trio had outside under a tree fifteen feet away from the school's picnic tables.

That was when Rick and George walked over, stopping five feet out of Sam's reach, and Rick pushed his brother behind him a bit. Danny quirked a brow at them, denial of any involvement with Phantom ready when the boxer held out his phone with a scowl on his face. "I must say, you're pretty good at keeping a secret in a town full of oblivious fools, but it looks like we're not the only ones who figured it out by seeing you reveal yourself when you thought you were alone." Noting the way all three older teens tensed, the freshman hit play and watched as Danny somehow paled even further and Sam's expression transitioned from disbelief to horror to outrage, while Tucker looked to be feeling a bit of shame. "I can give you the IP address of the system that it was uploaded from but Georgy already deleted it from the internet. Some guy named Wes seems to have figured out that you're Phantom from how you look."

Sky blue eyes gained an unearthly glow for half a second as Danny's gaze flicked from the screen to the twins. "And you didn't?"

"No, I was walking in the woods Saturday and heard an otherworldly melody playing near the lake." Rick shrugged, hand shoved in his jacket pocket. "It's amazing how often people overlook a tree as a hiding spot or even just a comfortable reading spot when you're in the forest. I'd have applauded then, but my mind kinda… lit on fire when I saw you transform into … who you currently are."

Tucker held one hand out while pulling up a program or three on his phone. "I'll take that IP address if you'd be so kind before Sam pummels you for invading Danny's privacy." A piece of paper was placed in his hand, and Tuck got to work while Sam and Danny got to their feet and the halfa placed a firm and restraining hand on his friend's shoulder.

"If you're planning on blackmailing him, I'd like to point out that you need fingers to type and do a great many things boys, I'd chose your reasons as to why I shouldn't break all twenty right now very carefully." the twins shivered a bit from the threat that the goth presented before George snorted and shook his head.

"See, if we had wanted to reveal his secret to the world, we would have added our own theories on what happened to make him like this instead of destroying the video evidence." leaning on his brother, the freshman smiled at the older teens. "I honestly wanted to ask how it really happened. I didn't like the thought of holding a secret that's not mine."

"Excuse my dumbass brother, he's smart with other things, I swear," Rick covered George's mouth and took another step back. "He just doesn't understand the concept of waiting for someone to realize the fact that he meant no harm with his actions in the past before asking a billion and five personal questions about that which is not his business. All I ask is that you not kill or possess us." Rick paused in his ramblings and tilted his head at the halfa. "...Did a cloud of blue smoke just come out of your mouth?"

Danny shivered as Tucker's phone went off and his lenses flashed with colors that anyone besides him would have found dizzying. "There are six ghosts being released at once all over town. Sending coordinates to your phones. Jazz and I'm assuming Valerie and your parents will be getting in on this." Tuck stood and tapped out several quick commands on his phone as the earth began to shake. "Based on that, I'd say we'll need some heavy gear."

"I'll head to FentonWorks and see if I can find something significant in the vault, you guys scout ahead and see what we're up against." Danny shifted behind the tree and transformed, a sour look on his face when he noticed that his jumpsuit was still gone. "George, Rick, evacuate with the rest of the civilians." Seeing protest in their eyes, the halfa flared his eyes bright green and upped the echo in his voice. " _ Now. neither of you is trained to handle this, get to safety. _ " The Pates nodded and ran as soon as the shaking stopped, at which point Sam and Tucker ran in opposite directions and Danny took to the sky.

* * *

 

When they got the alert from their ecto detection system, Jack and Maddie Fenton headed straight to their weapons vault. "There haven't been so many mid to high-level ghosts attacking Amity since the Ghost King incident," Maddie muttered under her breath as she loaded up their weaponry.

"There was that incident with the police ghosts," Jack reminded her, pulling up to a building on fire that also marked the closest signature. "That was pretty widespread."

"Yes, but the Ghost King's army posed a more significant threat." The fire wasn't just the building. A twenty foot tall orange flaming cat was batting at everything in sight. "Semi solidified elemental manifestation," Maddie muttered to herself as she took up control of the weapons while Jack put his crazy driving skills to great use and drove them around the huge monster that was currently slicing a building to shreds with its claws. It screeched as the green coated electrical arch struck its back and turned toward them, slamming a flaming paw down and creating a shockwave that rocked the RV and upturned other vehicles and some nearby trees.

* * *

 

Sam and Tucker ran up to what looked to be a giant blue raccoon with strange orange markings along its body. "I'd say that's easily twenty feet tall, not too hard to deal with, right?" Sam gauged as she examined what exactly it was doing. A paw struck the ground and the shaking started up again. "Scratch that, Danny we found the source of the quakes."

_ "Anything specific you'll need? I'm at the vault and looking through the stuff that we all made together. _ " The trio was extremely glad that they had built their own weapons in the lab, and that Danny knew of a part of the basement that his parents hadn't discovered yet, where he had built his own miniature version of the Fenton Vault to hold all of their weapons in.

"Something heat intensive with a broader range than this lipstick laser," Tucker let out a huff, glaring at his standard weapon before looking to the raccoon, what appeared to be sand flowing out of its feet. "Looks like an elemental, which means it'll return to its natural state once its back in the spirit world."

"Get us something that can heat sand into glass at a battle appropriate speed, we'll see if we can't distract it for now." Sam checked the charge on her ectopistol and began to run to the left flank of the raccoon, while Tucker took the right, and they fired at the same time.

* * *

 

Valerie was not impressed with what she saw tearing through the streets of amity park, as she had dealt with one just like this yesterday, only smaller. Of course, that didn't make the forty foot tall turtle crab rolling its spiky shell through downtown any less of a threat to the citizens. Val summoned a rifle to her hand, red light flaring at the arm of her suit, as the weapon materialized from the energy surrounding it. Taking aim at where she remembered at least three spikes to be in a row, she fired at the turtle and smirked when it stopped and roared in pain. However, instead of blasting water at her like the smaller crustacean did, this one opened its mouth and released a horde of smaller versions of itself, which all flew up to attack the Huntress.

Muttering a curse against ghosts everywhere, Valerie took aim and waited for the little turtle monsters to roar at her.

* * *

 

Jazz felt the ground shake, heard the alarms go off, and listened through the two used channels of her Fenton Phones to verify that her parents were right and it was indeed seven different ghosts all over the city. Once her parents were gone and Danny had arrived, Jazz was in the vault with him in her green and white hazmat suit that her mother made when she realized Jack's idea was obviously wrong. "One word about the jumpsuit and I swear I'll stuff you in a thermos for a whole ten minutes."

"I've spent longer in there because of you." he snorted and handed her the usual jack o nine tails that she liked to carry in a fight along with one of their standard rifles and sent off a duplicate with the Fenton E-38 rifles, which used a higher charge than the usual E-34, but they had yet to manage the power efficiency practically. "Based on what readings are coming off of the GAV I'd say we're dealing with a bunch of giant monsters. I really hope I don't have to deal with another one of those gorillas, or else I'll need Elle's help."

"Another gorilla? Is that really such a problem little brother? I bet even mom and dad could handle that." Jazz strapped a thermos to her belt and grabbed the Fenton Peeler as well. Checking a device on her wrist that she was glad her parents installed, the Fentons were in sector five, tuck and Sam in sector two and the familiar ecto signature that Tuck and Danny had keyed in as The Red Huntress was fighting in Sector three. "I'll take sector ten since it looks like that one is the closest to here. Did you finish up on the adjustments to the mini gravity inverter?"

"Do you mean 'finish  _ making _ the mini gravity inverter'? Because if so then yes, though I haven't had time to test it." The halfa took a deep breath and let his aura shift to blue, his eyes doing the same. Ice spread from the DP on his chest over his torso and to his limbs, forming ice armor. "The best thing about fighting and knowing math is that hexagonal patterns and fast thinking are great for ice based constructs." Another Danny appeared next to Jazz as one flew up through the ceiling of the vault. "I'll go with you to sector ten as back up and head down to sector twelve and handle whatever is there myself. Everyone on the Team should converge on sector fifteen afterward to deal with the last threat."

"Don't spread yourself too thin Danny." Making sure she had everything, Jazz wrapped an arm around the duplicate of her brother and they were turned intangible, flying up through the ceiling.

* * *

 

Fright Knight shared the views of his king: the ghosts of the Earth were a disgusting plague upon the Spirit World. They had waged a war between the Spirits of their world and the Ghosts of the Earth and had nearly won when that twice damned Timekeeper had informed the Ancients of how to seal away Pariah and Fright, and even created the sarcophagus. Spirits, as the natives of the world, were far more powerful and adaptive than ghosts, who were tied to their obsessions. Spirits were superior and should have rid the Spirit world of the ghost infestation three thousand years ago.

It was thus a surprise to find a ghost this powerful and skilled.

The white-clad ghost was using his teleportation skills well, though he was soon taken by surprise when Fright revealed his own prowess with the ability. The Knight had only been able to land knicks and punches on the assassin, but the other had only been able to land glancing shots that did more than scratch Fright's armor.

"What's the matter, old man, rusty from being locked in a pumpkin for so long?" Riter taunted with a laugh as he used his ranged focus to his advantage, and his shields when the Knight got too close. "You claim Spirits are superior in every way, but I seem to be holding my own against one of the most infamous spirits of them all." Of course, he was slammed into a wall seconds after making his snide comment, barely having enough time to put up a shield and raise his knee into the knight's gut.

"Your hubris shall be your final end,  _ ghost _ . None but Pariah himself can truly best the Fright Knight." The other vanished and reappeared behind Fright, reacting too quickly for the black-clad warrior's liking to the twin beams of energy that he fired from his eyes when he teleported to Riter's left. " _ Regardless of how powerful you are, you shall fall like so many others of your kind, and I shall relish in sending you to your nightmares for all eternity. _ " Bullet sized ectoblasts were fired his way silently and deflected with Soulshredder, but then the other teleported them to a different part of the Spirit World, sending the Spirit of Fear into a fit of outrage that this filthy human soul dared to transport  _ him _ without his consent.

Randy Riter laughed in the cover of dense jungle foliage, clicking his tongue like a disapproving parent when a brightly glowing green blade began slicing through tree trunks. "Bringing such harm to the Spirit World simply to kill one ghost? This is why the remains thereof are floating islands instead of the true world the legends claim it once was before you and your king ravaged the lands with your petty war." A soundless white light left a dent in the ink black armor and the assassin teleported to a different vantage point as his location from mere seconds ago was burned by a flaming purple meteor. " _ I'll be doing Her a favor by eliminating you." _

* * *

 

Seeing Danny show up on the scene was a great relief since there was little that the smaller weapons seemed to be doing against the sand monster. It had yet to pinpoint where exactly either hunter was, though its guesses were off by mere feet, flattening grass and replacing it with lakes of blue sand that rose up in jagged spikes everywhere after landing. The two had formed a good rhythm to keep its focus on the two of them solely, and not the city or its running civilians, though most of those had evacuated the scene; two, three or four shots from one was what it took to distract the beast, and once the other had gotten to their next hiding spot, they fired off their own set of shots. This could only work for so long, they knew, but they would have to hold off until Danny got there with the weapons they needed.

Of course, the damn raccoon turned two seconds faster than Tucker ran, having figured out the pattern by now. Huge balls of sand shot at Tuck, who's life flashed passed his eyes until a gust of arctic wind pushed the sand bullet off course by just enough inches to miss the geek. An ecto rifle was dropped in his hand, another at Sam's feet as Danny flung a large green fireball at the beast's tail, turning the sand into a mystifyingly beautiful glass. "Took you long enough."

"I'm sorry, is a hundred and twenty miles per hour not fast enough for you?" Danny retorted with a grin as he flipped into the visible spectrum just long enough for his friends and enemy to see his frozen armor before leaving sight once more and throwing a fireball at the raccoon's torso. "Don't suppose you're intelligent enough to listen to the reason of 'go home and we'll stop attacking you'?" All the halfa got in response was a broad swing at the area where his voice was coming from. "Worth a shot."

Sam shook her head and picked up her rifle, taking aim at the creature's tail and left leg. The bright green plasma that flew from the barrel of the weapon had much the same effect as Danny's fireball did, though it took a moment more. Seeing Tucker turn a toe - or what appeared to be one - to glass, she ducked under a swipe of the raccoon's tail and turned a chunk of it to glass, watching as that chunk broke off and fell to the ground. "I feel bad for the people who have to clean up after all of this."

* * *

 

Agents O and K remembered well Phantom's warning, a vengeful fury burned in their minds when they thought about it. When the scanners picked up on Phantom's ecto signature among the others attacking the city, they were tempted to go after him as well as the other filthy monsters assaulting their world.

But orders were orders, and they had been told to take a squad of their agents and deal with the larger and more immediate threats first. Pulling on the suits that had finally been repaired from the time that hunter ghost had escaped them, the two loaded up into their jets and took off, five white tank-like vehicles, four hover sleds and three more jets behind them. It may not have been an official invasion this time, but they would go out in force and destroy any spectral trash that got in their way.

Taking off, the squad headed towards the closest ecto entity, which happened to be a sixty-foot tall slug. When they opened fire on it from above, a jet was lost to a jet of acid.

* * *

 

Valerie's alarms were ringing in her ears when the crab-like turtles raced around her in a whirlwind, launching jets of water more intense than a fire hose every time she slowed by even a fraction of a second. She still managed to get a few hits and turn three of the suckers to splatters on the sidewalks, but her aim was being thrown off by the high speeds this fight demanded. A familiar beeping and display on her screen were all to welcome given the silently agreed upon truce she had made that weekend. "Where have you been ghost boy? Not like you to miss a party like this."

"I got held up," he laughed, sweeping a wave of icy power at the turtles and freezing two of them. "I'm here aren't I?" A sword appeared in his hand, and he resolutely told himself to ignore the green gore on the sidewalk. She was making progress, and this was to defend amity park. He'd deal with that later. For now, he sliced off the spike from one of the shells and kicked the turtle in front of him to the ground. "I see you're enjoying sea life outside of the sea. Maybe you should surf with that board sometime." Grabbing onto one mini crab, unsure as to whether they were babies or miniatures made from the largest turtle's power, he sealed it in a block of ice and dove to the ground, quickly opening up a portal to Clockwork-knew-where before grabbing the other frozen turtles and chucking them in as well, snapping it closed.

"You can make portals to the Ghost Zone?" Valerie quirked an unseen brow, dodging a jet of water and taking out an eye with her rifle. "That explains a few things." leaving the small fries to Phantom, the Huntress aimed her sights at the main monster, which had flooded at least five blocks by now. "I'll handle this miniature ocean before I  _ have _ to surf to school."

* * *

 

One thing that Danny had mentioned in passing- when he didn't realize either of his parents were paying an ounce of attention - was the benefits of having cold based weaponry.

The Fentons agreed for several reasons.

One of those reasons currently was the giant cat showing a particular dislike of their cryogenic grenades, mixed in with fire from the GAV's defense systems. As they swerved around a flaming tail slamming into the ground, a claw dug into the exterior of the tank like vehicle, but only left a scratch on the outside. In return for the markup, the system's low-level ghost shield electrocuted the foul feline, power from the ectoconverter keeping the shields from dropping more than a quarter in strength.

Maddie checked their supply, noting that they only had ten left, and activated the green lighting cannon at the top of the GAV, aiming for the center of the beast's chest. "Prepare for a shock sweety."

"Ready to hit the trigger anytime Mads," Jack grinned with his thumb over the trigger on the wheel of the GAV. Maddie primed two grenades and launched them as high as she could, grinning when the cat swiped a claw at the brightly glowing objects.

When the explosion went off and shrunk the beast, Maddie shouted "Now!" Jack jammed his thumb onto the button and green coated electricity flew from the cannon, striking the beast in the center of its chest and eliciting a roar of pain and outrage that lasted as long as the charge. After fifteen seconds of nearly unbearable noise, Jack let up on the trigger and watched as the cat fell onto its side, flames dimming significantly.

"I'll get it!" In seconds, Jack was out of his seat, thermos in hand, and on the street before the giant monster that had attacked them. It was ironic, really. Yesterday, he had seen proof that not all ghosts were evil, and was beginning to question why he was hunting each and every spirit down, and now he had just saved the town from at least one of the menaces that Phantom hadn't confronted.

A flash of white light and the giant feline was sucked into the thermos for safe keeping, and Jack was left with the aftermath of the fight to look over.

* * *

 

Jazz stared up at the challenge before herself and her brother with an irritated sigh. Of all things, it had to be horses. Thirty-foot tall horses with purple horns protruding from their skulls. Both were jet black, the tips of their two and three tails bright purple blurs. Hooves slammed onto asphalt, leaving imprints and causing cracks to splinter throughout the area. "I used to like horses too." Clicking her heels together, Jazz started up the miniature Gravity Inverters in the boots of her jumpsuit and wobbled a bit as she rose into the air. "That'll take a bit of getting used to."

"Yeah, but once you get used to it, it'll feel pretty awesome to fly," Danny grinned down at his sister before rising up to analyze the situation. Hands held out in front of him, the ghostly hero fired off beams of frost and yelled over his shoulder. "See if you can keep them distracted from the shadows, or at least keep out of munching range while I build a corral."

"Copy that." Jazz took a moment more to orient herself before rising up above the horses and aiming her ectorifle at the back end of the smaller horse, which had only two tails. It reared and glared at her, backing up with fury in its eyes. "Well, I've got one of them distracted." Jazz flew as close to the other as possible when she realized that the smaller horse was about to jump at her, and was shocked to see it stop in favor of neighing loud enough to shake buildings and crack glass. Jazz covered her ears instinctively, losing a bit of her stability in the air, and nearly got knocked out of it when a massive horn missed her by mere inches.

Thankfully, Danny paid more attention these days. With a flick of his wrist, he pushed his sister out of the way with a burst of cold air. "Few more seconds and I'll be good." returning his focus to the giant fence that he was creating, Danny poured on as much power as he had pumped into the duplicate. When he finally turned to blast at the hoof of one of the horned horses, there was a forty foot wall of ice that curved around in a nearly complete circle. The opening was just wide enough for the larger of the two equines to make it in.

The halfa's blast was well timed, as Jazz had nearly been eaten a second time in the fight. The startled horse reared back in shock and gave the redhead a great opening. With a few shots from her rifle and Danny's plasma blasts, the horses retreated into the open space they were given. The halfa then closed off the gate, his duplicate flickering like a malfunctioning hologram.

Once the horses were contained, and Danny had his bearings, he held out a hand to stop Jazz from sucking the beasts into the thermos she had brought. Taking a deep breath, the prince tested his authority once again.  _ "ENOUGH _ ," his voice echoed off of the ice and filed the corral with the force of his command. The freaked out horses froze in place, efforts to break through their containment ceased as all their muscles relaxed at once. " _ If you are intelligent enough to understand what I'm saying _ ," he started when they didn't resume their attempts at freedom, " _ Tell me what's happening." _

The larger of the two horses turned toward Danny and opened its maw, a voice that resounded like thunder from the sheer size of what spoke uttering enraging words.  _ "A spirit forced us to do this, one that resembled a vampire." _


	25. Deadly Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, more shit hits the fan, cause my tied for favorite assassin has found himself in a fight with fright and is giving him a run for his money, Danny gets violent when he's angry, Rick and George actually do something other than angst and research, and then you all get the funnest of surprises

One moment, Danny was alternating between setting up minor roadblocks to keep the sand from getting out of their view, and turning chunks of the raccoon to glass with heat, and the next he was seeing red. Frustration, fury, blinding and wrathful rage blanked out the duplicate's thoughts and functions for the two seconds needed for giant teeth the size of broadswords to clamp down around him, grinding against the ice that protected him. Heat like a desert sun assaulted his being, sands shifting like water and grating like stone against the chipping armor as he was swallowed whole. Faintly, Danny was aware that his friends were calling out to him in a moment of panic.

In the moment, however, he wasn't aware of anything but a burning desire to melt off Plasmius' face.

From the outside, Sam and Tucker had nearly blown their cover when Danny got eaten, fear warring with battle earned instincts. Luckily, Tucker had more immediate faith that Danny would get out of the sticky situation without help than Sam and held the goth back. "Give him a sec Sam. Pretty sure our snowcone can handle the beach."

Before Sam could shove the geek's baret down his throat for the quip, they heard the beast's horrible shriek of pain  and turned to see green light shining through the sand. From the inside out and all over at once, blue sand turned to what looked like precious stone holding in a green sun. Heat radiated from the now petrified body so intensely that the air vibrated around it. Rising out of the glass sculpture with burning red eyes and fists full of white hot plasma, Danny flicked a hand towards the ground.

"What happened that got your boxers in a twist?" Sam's gaze turned from the swirling green interdimensional vortex dragging the glass raccoon back to the Spirit World back to her friend in time to see him visibly relax all of his muscles at once.

" _ Plasmius. _ "

* * *

 

A raging sea, a blazing desert, the tundra of the Far Frozen and now a mountain in the far reaches of the Spirit World. One thing Fright would begrudgingly admit about his opponent was how well he knew the world and her lands … for a ghost. However, the Riter fool was weakening. Strong as they may be, his shields were deceptive in nature.

A strike of SoulShredder to the top of the bubble and the white haired assassin's cheek gained a thin line of leaking radioactive green. The ghost would vanish and fire upon him, only hitting true a handful of times. A swing, a miss, an ecto bullet to the knee, a slash to the arm. Riter's aura was flaring brightly, as was Fright Knight's, violet and white clashing everywhere they went.

A flare of violet and the Knight teleported them to the realm of Dreams, in the territory of Nocturne. The other spirit would understand, surely.   " _ Bringing us to a void of night, Fear mongerer? How advantageous for you. _ " Emerald steel met a wall of pure white, the sound of a thousand nails on a board ringing through the formless space around them. " _ Of course, that's disregarding very basic abilities, isn't it? _ " The gunslinger vanished, his aura dimmed to nothing, and SoulShredder cut through naught but air.

" _ Cowardly fool, show yourself! _ " A flash of white struck the knight's leg and a crack could be seen in his armor. " _ Impossible! _ "

" _ Hardly anything is impossible, dear Spirit of Fear. especially not in the realm of the mind. _ " Randy was having far too much fun on this job, though he couldn't be blamed for drawing out the fight. If he didn't pace himself well, the elder fighter would have impaled his core half an hour ago. Another shot to one of the joints in the armor, another minuscule crack grown noticeable. " _ You didn't think any smith would forge undefeatable armor, did you? Such is the act of a fool _ ."

" _ The same can be said of he who challenges the Maker of Nightmares! _ " Lashing out with a wide arc of his blade, Fright unleashed a wave of purple fire and grinned under his helm at the cry of pain he heard to his right. Striking swift as lightning, he stabbed into the direction of the voice and was met with a wall of force. " _ No matter how formidable you are, you shall fall as all others have before you. _ " A meteor of purple plasma formed in his free hand, raised to strike, when a sphere of white encompassed him, closing off the knight from the world of Dreams and Nightmares.

The blast rocked the inside of the bubble like an earthquake, but it held against the assault and slowly began to shrink. " _ As I said, your arrogance shall be your undoing. _ " Quickly, the bubble was pressing Fright into a rather uncomfortable position, even as jasmine shaded flames rose to his hands and filled the entirety of the sphere. " _ I've held magma in my bubbles before, Knight, your flames won't help y- _ AH!" Randy gripped his chest as the feeling of a blade piercing him stung through his link to the energy holding the knight prisoner.

Cracks formed and splintered along the shell of white until it shattered from the pressure of holding in the force of terror incarnate. A blazing emerald gaze leveled itself upon the form of a panting and weathered assassin. " _ This shall be your last hunt, cur. _ "

" _ Ah, so you've heard the tales of White Fang? _ " Riter laughed, ignoring the stabbing pain in his gut and chest, and grinned wolfishly at the other, eyes blazing white as a supernova. " _ I think I'll take a few more bites out of that armor. _ " A flare of white and the world was bright grays, silver, and gold - dots of all colors surrounding them.

* * *

 

Danny was coming to hate gorillas. Truly and surely hate them. The forty foot tall giant in front of him screeched and howled in rage, spewing lava and death in every direction. Already, he had had to disperse three fires and yank ten civilians out of the way of the erupting monkey, and the fight hadn't even begun yet. When it finally did, the information of who was behind this channeled through from his duplicates and Danny's vision was filled with arctic blue. The ice covering his skin grew colder and snow fell around them, turning to steam when it got within an inch of the gorilla. A spiked ice coated fist collided with the jaw of the beast, followed up by a kick to its gut. A tail lashed out and wrapped around him, which he covered in frost that nearly overcame the beast's heat.

The monkey roared in outrage and flung Danny towards one of the buildings, shocked by the snowball slamming into its face not a second later. The halfa grabbed a fist full of fur and let loose a current of electricity, giving the monkey a true shock. Quick as a viper, Danny turned the sparks into veins of ice to spread all over the now statically styled fur in his grip and attempted to freeze the gorilla over once more.

" _ I'm not in the mood to fight a fucking monkey again today, so I recommend you stand down, now, or I will actually hurt you. _ " A giant hand groped around for the source of the imminent frostbite and found purchase on Danny's barbed form. " _ Last. Warning. _ " As he was pulled off, the prince drew in a deep breath, preparing to end this right then and there when he was raised up to eye level with the lava monkey.

" _ You are a violent one, aren't you? _ "

* * *

 

"What are you doing?!" George was practically screeching at his brother as Rick came out of their house holding a glowing book. "Where did you get that?"

"To number two, the attic. To the first question: I am looking for something to help Danny Sam and Tucker." Leafing through the pages, Rick's eyes flicked back and forth faster than they ever had, blue slowly turning silver as the sky was swallowed by green clouds. "Before you say that they don't need help-"

"Actually," George interrupted and yanked his brother along with him towards the epicenter of the cloud cover. "I was going to say 'hooray, you have your grimoire, let's get to the part where we do something useful.' Cause standing around talking about helping, doesn't actually help." While Rick had retrieved his book, George had grabbed the white handled Athame that he had found a while ago in a hidden box in the bushes. Engraved within the blade of the knife was a pentagram that seemed to glow in the eerie emerald light blanketing the area, and it was currently in the pocket of the telekinetic's jacket.

"This looks like quite the battle that we're running into Georgy," Rick glared up at the green tinged sky, and held up his hand, surprising himself when the air around it seemed to shimmer with silver light. "Let's even the odds up a bit more huh? Cause it looks like our favorite half ghost is missed a spot, and I doubt the GIW will be doing anything useful" A screeching roar shook the area, and both twins had to cover their ears for a painful moment.

Nodding to each other, the pair ran off down the sidewalk, glad that they had pushed each other to go out and hike every weekend, either to prepare for a match or look for a cryptid.

* * *

 

After cutting through nearly every spike on the shell of the ghost turtle monster, Valerie thought it would be as simple as blasting it until it went into the portal back to its home.

It was simpler still, thanks to Phantom's temper tantrum.

There wasn't really any other word she could use to describe him shouting in seemingly unprovoked rage and blasting every cretaceous tortoise in the area with enough force the launch them a whole twenty feet away. All of them retreated into the portal he had formed, but not before the largest of the bunch received a burn mark on its shell from a continuous beam of plasma that threatened to cut it in half.

"Don't get me wrong, Phantom," Val started, ecto rifle still held readily in hand. "I don't have much love lost with ghost animals attacking the town mindlessly, but that was a bit much on the violent side wouldn't you say?"

" _ Plasmius is involved. _ " Danny took a deep breath to clear his head and shook the red from his eyes. With a voice of cold tranquility, he pointed at the closing vortex of energy. "These beasts were forced here by Plasmius under threat of death."

This caused the huntress to raise an unseen brow, skepticism lacing her words. "How can a  _ ghost _ die? Aren't you all already dead?" The glare she was given made the teen cringe slightly, but she didn't show it beyond the privacy preserving visor of her helmet.

"We have an equivalent to a heart, it's called the core. Pierce that, which I easily could have done with each of the beasts here, and we're dead." It did, barely, occur to Danny just who he was entrusting this lethal piece of information with.  She had yet to start shooting at him, though, and the current fight was over so she earned a tiny bit of trust in his less than focused state. "I can't hold this duplicate so far away for much longer. Be on the lookout for Plasmius, and if you see him," Danny tapped his DP insignia. "Aim for the chest."

Valerie watched with a mix of emotions as Phantom's form blurred into arctic blue light and flown off towards where she imagined the original Phantom to be. He had just told her the point at which to aim her cannons and kill Vlad Plasmius.  Not something she liked the implications of. A rapid beeping pulled her attention away from musings of Phantom's mental state and back to the situation at hand. The largest spike in ectoenergy in the town was near the Nasty Burger, and the ground was still shaking all over.

Aiming herself toward her workplace, Val shot off, ectobazooka at the ready.

* * *

 

Agent U jerked his fighter jet just in time, another glob of acid brushed close enough to peel white paint. A push of a button rained down missiles on the putrid undead but to no avail. Bombs hit the buildings behind the ghost, blowing out their first stories; agent U let loose a growl of frustration. This filthy ectoplasmic mutant was proving a bigger challenge than they were ready for at the moment. The more it was blasted, the wilder it got. "Focus fire on its tail." When they burned a hole into the trailing body that drug against the ground behind it, the monster shrieked in pain and shrunk just enough for it to be noticeable. Unfortunately, none of them had the maneuverability to attack without getting melted out of the sky. A missile was launched and the blasters on his jet were aimed at the head whilst the tanks on the ground attacked from behind, melted into puddles as soon as they landed a hit.

A streak of black and shining red cut through their ranks and over the monster, several explosions popping up along its body and earning a horrid sound that stung the agent’s ears even through his sound proofed cockpit. One of the local ghost hunters, equipped with technology like but better than their own. Frustration fueled the charge as U refused to be shown up by the damned Red Huntress coming in and trying to save them from a ghost. Circling around, she aimed at the tail and launched three missiles along with a barrage of ectoblasts from the jet's laser barrels. Red swerved around to toss grenades into the slug's mouth, risking her life so close to the monster's jaws. With the assistance of a more agile asset, however, U had to admit that they were able to split the beast's focus far easier, pelting it with blasts from all sides while focusing mostly on the tail. They would have this ghost obliterated.

* * *

 

Sam and Danny had been viciously swearing painful vengeance upon the halfa's billionaire arch enemy when Tucker's glasses lit up once again, a small green radar screen appearing in his vision. Several of the dots were accounted for: Jazz's Fenton Peeler, the signal broadcast constantly by the doctors Fenton's jumpsuits, Valerie's Not Quite an Ectosignature, and several GIW signatures surrounding the last ghost they'd yet to get to. He recognized one of the two new signatures, but not the other red dot. "Guys, we have Fright Knight and some other unidentified ghost fighting over the park."

"Any readings on power?" Danny was already grabbing them both around their waists and rose into the air. "I'd like to know how many duplicates I need to get rid of for this."

"Whoever it is, seems to be about as strong as Fright." Not good. Danny made a beeline for the park, two duplicates dispersing into an ethereally glowing mist before rushing off towards the park holding his friends, and to the real Danny that was flying toward the park from his monkey business.

He'd need all his power for this.

* * *

 

Cuts and bruises littered Randall's form, as cracks did Fright Knight's armor, plume of violet flame not nearly as bright or intense as usual. Even so, light surrounded the assassin, flames shrouding the knight, and a bullet of crackling energy met flaming steel head-on. " _ You fight well for a ghost, but I grow weary of this battle." _ in a burst of flame, he was behind the assassin and causing cracks to form in the bubble of white light that protected him from Soul Shredder's nightmares. " _ You shall not defy me any longer! _ "

" _ No need, dear Knight," _ Randy chuckled darkly as a small cloud of red smoke appeared behind Fright, just as Danny Phantom and friends came in behind Randy. " _ I wonder where Spirits go when they fade." _

"FRIGHT!" Danny's frantic cry echoed across the park, all but a second too late. A red and white blade thrust through from the center of Fright Knight's chest, glowing the color of human blood but dripping with ectoplasm. The wielder floated behind his victim with a satisfied grin, helmet hardly hiding his identity.

" _ No one betrays  _ **_me_ ** _ , Fright Knight. _ " the elder halfa yanked his blade out and blasted the Spirit of Fear to the ground, forming a small crater. Even as a small violet fireball was thrown in his direction, the vampiric half ghost cackled in victory. "I have slain the bringer of Nightmares! Who now would dare to stand in my way?"

Vlad's arrogant question was answered by a solid beam of pure blue ectoplasm, cold and hot at once, testing the integrity of his armor. " _ You've gone too far Plasmius! I will have your  _ **_head!"_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes, i killed him. why would i let the traitor live?


	26. Halfa Battle over Amity Central Park

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> violence. literally, that is the description of this chapter.  
> V I O L E N C E   
> I O L E N C E  
> O L E N C E  
> L E N C E  
> E N C E  
> N C E  
> C E  
> E !!!!!!!!!

Sam expected to hear quips and the classic 'gonna kick your ass' from a pissed off Danny. What just came out of her best friend's mouth was not something she ever thought she'd hear.

" _ Vlad Damian Plasmius, as King of Spirits I find you guilty of murder! _ " Danny wasn't listening. Looking down to the ground, he saw Fright's armor was gone, all that was left of him a dimly glowing Soul Shredder lying in a puddle of ectoplasm. A duplicate appeared to Plasmius' left and blasted him into the ground, another Danny rising from the earth with a pillar of arctic power coating the vampiric half-ghost with deadly frost.

"You are no King,  _ boy _ . Certainly not mine!" Plasmius sneered at the younger spirit as chunks of ice melted and steamed off of him. A trio of Plasmius attacked their respective targets. The one who had near frozen him was blasted through his core before anything could be done. "I was as involved in Pariah's fall as you were."

" _ I rallied my enemies from the Spirit World against his army, I challenged Pariah to a duel for the crown, I defeated Pariah, I removed the crown from his head, and I forced him into the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep! _ !" A sword made of ice rose from Phantom's hand and blazed with power, blade meeting red steel when a Plasmius got too close. A shield made of frost forming on his arm to deflect the sword that cost him his Knight. " _ All you did was turn the key that you stole in the first place. I am your King and your  _ **_executioner!"_ **

Sam glanced over at Tucker, same angry, horrified expression staring them right back at her, and tightly gripped her rifle. The technogeek pulled out his phone and started typing. "I'm really hoping this works…" one last click of his phone and it was in his pocket while his ectorifle was raised and aimed at the nearest Plasmius.

* * *

 

Valerie wasn't always one for the finer details, she could accept and admit that. One of those finer details would be the GIW not being very careful with their aim, several near misses disrupting her own. aim. When a missile nearly took her head off, the Huntress returned fire as a warning - one that hit dead on with minimal damage. "Look, you government spooks, this is my town and if you shoot me while I'm fighting a ghost, you'll find yourselves joining the ghost!"

One agent wearing a jetpack took aim at her and Valerie prepared to shoot him out of the sky when he stopped and switched targets. Apparently, they realized how much they needed her at the moment. The radar of her visor alerted the Huntress of another threat over Amity Central Park and a small spike in ectoenergy closer by, just as she swerved around a blob of acid and a large silver hammer hit the slug's head. "Time to test something out…" she flew up above the jets and concentrated.

Three metal cubes appeared around her in a flash of red light. The circuits glowed brighter, however, and the cubes began to change, expanding until they were the sizes of basketballs, along with gaining twelve sides. Valerie glared down at the monster melting her city and the drones she made flew down to attack it. A rocket fired from one, while the other two rained down continuous beams of pink energy. "This, I could get used to." She'd deal with that other threat later if Phantom didn't finish it off before she got there. Right now, she had a slug to salt, and it wouldn't take much longer.

* * *

 

If it weren't for how close he was to dying at the moment, Tucker would find it symbolic how oppositic Danny and Vlad truly were. At the moment, he was just glad the portable ghost shields held up to ectoflames. According to what he was seeing, Plasmius held back every time they had fought him before. One shot to another copy's face and the geek was raising his shield again, grateful magic swords and armor couldn't be duplicated.

The shield was dropped again and Sam stabbed into a Plasmius, burning his chest, and ducked under a blade made of his own energy - which happened to be red. Pink was his watered down version. Above them, Danny and Vlad were trading blows and thunder crashed with every clash of their fire and ice powers. Tucker shot at the Plasmius currently assaulting his eyes with his gaudy outfit.

Sam wished to hell she had remembered to wear her shield generator, since dodging every strike was exhausting. The vampiric halfa dove at her and she blasted his face, slashing at his arm. His arm fell off, the sickly sweet scent of ectoplasm filling the air as he launched a fireball from his remaining hand. A ball of blue missed her by an inch, deflected off the blade of the original Plasmius, but the ice that sprung up from the point of impact scraped against the duplicate, dispersing it.

Phantom ducked a fireball, swung his sword and launched a volley of ice shards at Plasmius, flying over to his left, brought his sword down on his armored enemy. The metal didn't give, but neither did his sword. Plasmius stabbed up at him and his armor chipped, just as he shifted out of the way. Rays of power flew from Phantom's eyes, pushing the elder halfa back and coating his sword in frost. Plasmius let loose a pair of fireballs that arched around the prince's blast, slamming into him with the force of a car.

Phantom phased out of visibility, splitting into three and flying circles around their adversary. " _ I see you've got some new tricks, you vampire rip off! Or are you an actual ghost vampire and you somehow stole that firepower from some other ghost? _ " A blast from one Phantom, a cloud of ice shards raining down on Plasmius. " _ I wonder how many lives you've taken in the name of your greed and obsession? _ "

_ "I don't take count, boy." _ Not bothering to shield himself from the attacks, Plasmius swung his sword around in a circle, waves of red slamming into his attackers. " _ Though you shall join their ranks! _ " Shadow copies flew from his body, lunging at the Phantom duplicates. A punch from a spiked fist of ice slammed into Plasmius' face and knocked off his helmet, revealing his horned hair.

" _ The only ranks I'm joining are my own, Plasmius! _ " His sword grew into a staff and he made use of his training with Pandora. He deflected a fireball and shoved his slightly melted staff into the center of Plasmius' chest plate, a charge of electricity ran along the elder's armor and earned a roar of anger. The shadow copies were frozen solid and thrown to the ground.

Plasmius shot Phantom away and reached a taloned hand out to grab his leg, snarling as frost crawled over his gauntlet. " _ I will melt you into a puddle and create a new halfa from your remains! Without your interference, no one will stop me from taking what's mine! _ " The ice hissed, mist filling the air. Phantom blasted his foe away, blades of ice springing from his own gauntlets. He stabbed his blades into the vampiric halfa's armor, cracks forming in them.

Sam shoved her ectosabre into Plasmius' core and grinned when she heard the original Vlad let out a cry of pain. "Tuck, aim for the core and make it hurt, we might be able to help Danny from here."

"There's a cage made of ice around Plasmius, I think Danny's got it handled." He fired at the center of Plasmius' chest at the same time as Sam hitting his head. The duplicate curled his arm back, a fireball in the palm of his hand with Tucker's name on it. Sam sliced through his leg, throwing off his aim. Tuck shoved the barrel of his rifle into Plasmius' chest and pulled the trigger, letting out a groan of disgust as ectoplasm-covered him. "I'm gonna be having nightmares tonight."

Phantom raised his right blade, aiming to stab some part of Plasmius' face. When the elder deflected with his own sword, Phantom snarled at him and made to slice his head off with his left blade. Plasmius kneed him in the gut and kicked him away, twin rays of red leaving a crack in the Prince's armor before a shield was raised. Four of Plasmius glared down upon him, one splitting off to go after his friends once again but impaled by a spear of borean energy.

" _ Striking with lethal force, boy? _ " Plasmius drove his heel into Phantom's back, before losing his head, another duplicate's arm getting blasted off by the wrathful Prince's own copy. " _ And yet you claim to have the moral high ground? You're doing just as I am!" _

" _ I strike in the name of  _ **_Justice_ ** _ , you cur. _ " Phantom retracted his blades, replacing them with four per arm. A cross-jab was aimed Plasmius' way, waves of energy scything through the air. Plasmius blocked the attack, only to hear ice grating against metal as Phantom dug his claws into the elder halfa's backplate. " _ You are no more than a murderer! _ " Phantom caught Plasmius' sword between the blades of his gauntlet and twisted it out of his reach, swings leaving claw marks on the vampiric spirit's chest plate.

Plasmius snarled and exhaled a veritable river of fire, melting away a good chunk of Phantom's armor. " _ I can see you're rather determined to kill me, boy, but can you do that while protecting your precious  _ **_friends_ ** _? _ " Shadow copies flew from Plasmius' darkened form like bats out of hell towards his friends. Phantom turned to rain down shards of ice on the duplicates but never got the chance. Beams of magenta light cut through the darkness and a missile struck the original Plasmius in the chest. Looking up, Phantom grinned while rebuilding his armor.

"He doesn't have to, Plasmius!" An ectobazooka formed in hand and the Red Huntress took aim at Plasmius, grinning at his flaming snarl.

* * *

 

"Mokuto, something urgent just came up," Elle stood from her lotus position, racing towards the Fenton Phone that had been beeping incessantly for the past ten minutes. A quick check confirmed it wasn't radio chatter and her worries were entirely valid. "I have to go help my brother and his friends."

Mokuto, for his part, didn't look particularly displeased. He stood to his full height and patted his student's hair. "Perhaps you can put your lessons to good use then?" She nodded and dashed for the edge of the Forest, putting in her FentonPhone and going over the channels she knew the trio used.

"Someone fill me in, what's going on and how can I help?" She expected Tucker or Sam or even Jazz to tell her, but Danny's voice was a pretty big surprise.

" _ Elle, I have a way for you to help _ ." The echo of his voice was more intense than normal. " _ I need you to go to the Far Frozen and ask Frostbite about the Anriothadh. I need it for this fight. _ "

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but that didn't sound like English, Danny." Regardless, she pulled out the repurposed iPod Tucker had given her, a map of all routes they knew of in the Spirit World on full display. "What is it, exactly?"

_ "Not much time Elle. I'm a duplicate Danny didn't absorb and I'm about to turn into mist." _ The copy's voice flickered in and out like a signal threatening to fail and the ghost girl nodded.  _ "Frostbite will know, just tell hi—" _ His voice cut out and Elle set off towards the frozen tundra of the Spirit World.

* * *

 

Tucker noticed Plasmius shrug off Valerie's latest shot before returning fire. Danny was capable of getting hurt whenever Val shot at him in the past, but Plasmius didn't seem to know he had been shot. The geek pulled out his PDA and did his best to scan the copy closest to him before switching his FentonPhone frequency until he picked up on Valerie's swearing. "Huntress, this is Tucker Foley. I noticed your shots aren't hurting Plasmius, and judging by your language you noticed as well." Another roll behind a large decorative rock and Tucker charged up another shot to the halfa's face. "I can fix this in one of two possible ways: either you let me into your systems, or I hack further in and adjust the frequency of your ectoblasts so they're tuned to his ectosignature. That should give you an automatic lock and your shots will actually hit him whether he's tangible, visible or not."

"Access granted, Foley. We'll talk about you finding my com frequency after we get this creep in a thermos." Ducking another fireball and grunting as a follow up grazed her arm, Valerie grinned as the circuits in her blaster turned from purple to red. All systems targeted Plasmius and her drones fired at once, knocking the copy out of the sky and into a cloud of red mist. Glancing at the ground, she saw Sam Manson - of all people - dueling with a copy. The goth with a sword suspiciously like the Fright Knight's, and the copy with a sword of pure red energy. Assured that she would hit the spook and not the goth, Valerie fired directly at its core but swore under her breath when red light grazed its arm, leaving a burned away hole in the skin.

Another copy of Plasmius appeared behind Val and would have stabbed her right through the heart were it not for the words cried out a moment before, unheard by the combatants. " _ Quae mali spiritus! _ " Chains made of silver light appeared out of the green tinged atmosphere and wrapped themselves around each Plasmius, tightening until they fell. Glancing toward the minor spike in ectoplasmic energy, the huntress noted two people in the trees. One had his hand held up high and glowing with the same silvery white light that held the Plasmius copies tight, while the other one focused on the lake. A closer inspection revealed balls of water rising in time to his waving hands. They were lobbed at the burning trees.

"This is very helpful, actually," George commented casually as he put out another burning tree and sagged a bit with exhaustion. "Restraining a homicidal spirit sounds like something that would help if the ghost hunters would  _ contain or destroy him _ , ya know?"

"Can't hold this much longer man, it feels like my hand is freezing and burning at the same time." The cold sensation he recognized from when he first used magic, but the heat was definitely coming from Plasmius. Even as his copies were being destroyed, the original's aura was flaring brighter and brighter until the chains snapped and Rick fell onto his back, panting heavily. "Fuck, that hurt!"

"Got a quick freezing spell in ya?" George picked up some water and held it between them and the incoming fireball in the shape of a disk, letting out a sigh of relief when latin words spilled from his brother's lips and the water froze, melting on impact. "This is not good, man, he can probably still make copies."

"Yeah, but he'll be preoccupied with the actual hunters," Rick got to his feet panting and wiped the grass and grime that stuck to his head with sweat away. "But let's move anyway, yeah?" grabbing his brother's hand, the boxer ran into the forest, using a path he remembered from the times he raced his father around the park and shrieked when a cape-wearing spirit with blood red eyes appeared out of nowhere and glared at them.

To the surprise of both brothers, it was George who acted first. He pulled the athame out of his jacket and thrust it into the center of the spirit's chest as hard as he could, shocked when the blow connected. Red mist dispersed before them, and the pentagram glowed with red light. "Thank the spirits, right?"

"Yeah, we should move." Rick didn't like how intense the light of the blade was getting. If he was right about this guess, they'd be holding onto that for a while. Grabbing it, he

* * *

slashed at the air behind them and was met with a horror-movie hiss but so much worse. "Go!" Shoving his brother, he ran, keeping an eye on the glow of the athame's blade.

Elle hated being left out of a fight. That's not to say that she was a violent person, but if her brother was battling for his life the young halfa would like to know and help him. Were it any other situation, she would have beelined for the Fenton Portal and joined him, but when Danny used his serious voice, people listened. Soaring through the green space of the Spirit World, the ghost girl was glad to finally find the cave covered in ice and snow marking the edge Far Frozen territory. She swooped in at top speed, glad to make progress.

"Frostbite! Are you there?" Elle called out in the echoing cavern as the temperature dropped to the point where she began to shiver. "Danny is in trouble and he said that you could help!" Sensing a pair of spirits nearby, the ghost girl dove towards the ectosignatures and stopped cold before the razor tips of ice spears pointed at her.

"State your name and business," one yeti growled out, yellow eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"My name is Elle Phantom," she explained quickly, making sure the emblem on her chest was visible. "My brother is in a battle with his arch-enemy and his friends told me that Frostbite would have something that he'd need." The guards seemed to consider this for a moment before one flew off further into the frozen territory.

The guard came back minutes later along with a slightly larger yeti wearing a bright blue sash. "I am Frostbite, young ghostling, and I hear that you are a relative of the Great One?" There was obvious skepticism in his voice and the raised brow he gave her, but Elle didn't have time for that.

"Yes, I'm his little sister," she transformed and shivered before switching back. "He sent me here to get something called the Anriothadh? He's fighting Plasmius and he wouldn't have told me about it if he didn't need help immediately."

"I see, young Phantom," Frostbite nodded in satisfaction that she was sincere in her words, turning in towards his territory. "We have little time to waste, come with me." Along the way, Frostbite told her of the time that Danny had come to him, both for the infimap and for training with his ice powers. "Should you ever develop such abilities yourself, young one, we can train you as well." The royal yeti offered warmly as they approached a cave rather out of the way. Frostbite had left his guard behind a while ago, and now it was simply the two of them.

"Actually, I'm learning from a friend here in the Spirit World about my powers," she shook her head lightly, a polite, if fleeting, a smile stretching over her features. "I'm a life core, according to him." Another shiver ran throughout her body. "Can I ask what exactly is the Anriothadh?"

"Something that only the rightful ruler of this world can claim." Ringing the walls of the cave from ceiling to floor were symbols and sigils in what appeared to be Alomoran and other languages Elle didn't recognize at all. "This was a weapon crafted by the Far Frozen in ancient times, when the original Spirit King united the world in peace, as a show of our fealty to him. When Pariah rose to power and began the war, the weapon was taken back." The cave, though littered with protective sigils, had seemed a rather natural one until the very end.

A large chamber-like room with images of a being in armor and robes displayed around the room both as a statue and a carving in the walls themselves, though the carvings seemed to be made of sigils as well. In the center of the chamber was a pedestal, with a sword carved from the ice of the tunnel itself. Runes and sigils stood out in the flat center of the blade, much like the chamber holding it.

"This, Elle Phantom, is Anriothadh, The King's Frost. Considering the sigils surrounding us, I recommend against trying to remove it from the pedestal." Frostbite held out his large furry arm to stop the ghost girl just as she moved to reach for the sword. "Only I, the king that the sword was made for, crowned or not, and the one chosen to bestow the weapon upon him may touch this sword without being flash frozen to absolute zero."

"Well, that's nice to know," she chuckled softly and watched as the royal yeti reached out and waved a glowing blue claw, the sigils around them shining with the same light, before walking up to retrieve the sword. "So, will you be bringing the sword to him?"

"No no, princess, that would be you," Frostbite grinned at the halfa and handed her Anriothadh, and she accepted it cautiously. "I have a rather quick way for you to get back, too."

* * *

 

A blast of red left a dent in crimson armor, a blade deflected a beam of green and raging scarlet flames met cobalt flurries of frost and snow, thunder echoing across the city from the clashes of fire and ice. Phantom was coming at Plasmius with everything he had, forming weapon after weapon from ice; swinging, slashing, jabbing and kicking with a precision born of practice. Power flooded the very air and the atmosphere was nearly as green as the Zone. Occasionally, silver would wrap around the elder or block his attack where his attackers could not, but where it was coming from he could only guess.

Tucker was scared. His best friend was fighting in the air against a foe they had never truly beaten in battle before, only thwarting his plans. That same foe continued to make more of himself to keep them from helping directly, Tucker's shield cracking every time he threw it up before answering with a blast of his own. These copies were meant to be distractions, not nearly as solid or powerful as the original, but still stronger than he would like to fight hand to hand. This wasn't like other times they had dealt with Plasmius; this was for keeps.

Sam was furious. Vlad had forced a lethal disease on them just to make Danny cure him, threatened to kill Jack and rape Maddie, but this? This was straight up murder, and she wouldn't stand for it. As she stabbed another copy in the core, Sam promised herself never to let that bastard out once they got him in the Fenton Thermos.

As she swerved around a blast and fired off a volley of her own, Valerie felt conflicted. She was freaked out by the power her employer - soon to be former - was displaying, of Tucker - a geek who couldn't run a yard without getting tired - and Sam were helping almost as well as she, only encumbered by their earthbound status. At the same time, she was filled to the brim with righteous fury, satisfaction and Justice because she would finally be locking away that smug rich bastard for good! She could sort out her mess of emotions later, though. At the moment, she was surrounded by duplicates and had some grenades to launch.

Rick was fascinated, not nearly as tired as he expected himself to be. A quick glance into the water earlier had shown him his own eyes glowing in this miasma of ectoplasmic energy, which he seemed to pull to his hand as he concentrated on the next spell he would use. George had erected a dome of light around them, leaving Rick to slash at the shadows when the blade of his knife grew bright while the tech savvy twin looked through the book as much as Rick had, since all the words he needed were in a language he knew well. When Rick saw George raising his hand and a chunk of ground rose up to keep a fireball from hitting Sam, both the ground and George's hand were glowing golden like the sun in all of this green. Whatever it was that was going on with them, they'd have to figure it out. "Put the book down!" he shouted when a taloned hand left a mark on George's arm, his reaction a second too late.

Phantom was livid. Fright had been adapting to the new situation, obviously, but he had proven a loyal Knight and did not deserve death for his loyalty to the ruler of the Spirit World. Plasmius had crossed a line and he wouldn't be doing it again. Every bit of creativity the halfa could spare was being put into this battle; ecto staffs charged with electricity, fireballs and ice beams launched together, and every combination of his powers that came to mind. When he was too slow, silver light shielded him from the incoming blast of fire, and every few seconds, Plasmius would wince as though stabbed by something the prince couldn't see.

Finally, a wave of energy swept out and knocked all humans in the fight to the ground, though silver and gold light surrounded Tucker and Sam to protect them. Plasmius raised his sword, shrouded in maroon fire, and brought it down upon Phantom. Phantom summoned a sword of ice, a miniature storm surrounding the blade, and brought it up to block the strike. Electricity arced and thunder boomed through the whole city when the swords clashed, yet the halfas did not waver, their auras staining the green sky crimson and azure. Plasmius' mouth opened wide and he sucked in a breath, flames rising from the back of his throat. Phantom did the same, power, sound and ice a whisper away.

Then wrongness steeped the air like a stench. The spirits stilled, sixth senses ringing with alarm as something was suddenly there, all around them, in the air, in the ground, in the very world itself, something was  _ wrong wrong wrong _ -

The sound of metal twisting against metal rang in the ears of the halfas, cutting through the unnatural silence and Phantom looked up, wishing instantly he hadn't, praying this was one of Nocturne's tricks, Clockwork teaching him some lesson he needed to learn, anything but that!

A dented and damaged thermos fell to the ground, the cap landing near it as white flames and blood-colored light shone over the park. A twisted and unnatural aura blanketed the area and Danny pulled back from his clash with Plasmius, a horrified whisper of " _ No, no no no no no no no  _ **_no no no no no NO_ ** ," rushing out of his mouth like a waterfall bursting through a dam.

A dark dream-haunting chuckle rumbled and the halfas were blasted to the ground, black and white flashes rising from the craters they made. "Danny boy, how nice to see you again."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> why yes, i am evil, thanks for noticing my lovelies


	27. The End?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Is this the end of the story? ......  
> HA  
> this one officially, yeah, but there's more to it than this. got too many plot bunnies to cover. so, I enthuse you all to write what you think happens afterwards and send it to me on tumblr, the link to said blog is here and at the end  
> Tumblr.com/blog/summonedphantomau  
> send your thing for the au there. let's see if we can't get this to match the transcendence

The only ones not overcome with shock were Valerie, Rick, and George. Valerie was the first to act. The biggest cannon she could think up was blasting away at the new threat, disturbed by the familiar insignia on the ghost's chest. "Who the hell are you?" Aside from the initial two shots, the flaming-haired spook was dodging her every attack. She threw a grenade, and he turned into a cloud of smoke. A black gloved hand covered in red energy slammed into the shield that her suit provided and cracked it, pushing the huntress back several feet even as her orbiting drones fired at his chest and face, the third raining missiles upon him from above.

"An old friend who's been waiting to meet you again. I like your new outfit," he sneered, fangs longer and sharper than Plasmius'. "Though I have to wonder where you got the upgrade." Ectoplasm covered the evil Spirit's fingers and solidified in the form of talons that cut against her shield.

"I don't know who you are, ghost, but I am gonna take you down and then get back to dealing with Plasmius." Valerie had little time for this freak that had gotten in a cheap shot on Phantom and Plasmius. That's all it could have been, right? Firing off a couple of missiles at him, she fired where he had dodged and growled when he split in two, and did so again to evade her next shot.

"Ah, Val, always so preoccupied with your anger and revenge that you can't even see the real threat is right in front of you," whirling around, the huntress slashed a copy sneaking up behind her in the chest with a red serrated knife and grinned as it dissipated into smoke. "Though I will commend that you've gained a bit of skill from how I remember you being at this age."

A glance to the ground showed Sam heading towards the fallen thermos whilst Tucker was adjusting… something, on his arm. Two copies of Dan flew after his old friends, forked tongue lashing in the air. Valerie fired off a shot at the copies with her drones while her board unleashed a volley of bullet sized ectoblasts. "Back off ghost! You're not touching those civilians!"

"Civilians?" A barrier of red light rose up to deflect the blasts. "You still don't know about them?" The destructive ghost let out a loud bark of laughter, turning invisible and flying circles around the huntress. "Can't say I'm surprised, you give them little reason to trust you."

"But you still could have informed the girl who could have helped you take down Vlad that she was working for a-" the copy that had gotten a hold of Tucker grunted in pain as it was blasted back by a beam of dark red energy coming from his gauntlet. "I see the geek has gained some skills."

"Thanks to your better self, yeah." turning the shield up to max, Tucker pulled out the lipstick laser and aimed for Dan's core, a cold look in his eyes. The moment a fist collided with the protective dome, he jabbed the tip of the laser against the core of the copy he was facing and dropped the shield for a single second, piercing the copy and jumping away from the invisible one that showed up his adjusted radar.  "Hooray for gravity inverters and flying suitcases."

Sam was switching between sword and pistol whenever the evil fusion got near, ducking as many clawed swings as she could and blocking waves of ectoplasm with SoulShredder. Leaping over a wave, she fired downward and slammed her boot into the face of the copy lurking invisibly, slicing through the one that got up behind her. Feeling a twitch beneath her, the goth backflipped and jammed the barrel of her pistol into the ghost's core.  A red ball of energy slammed into her gut, eliciting a grunt of pain. Her aim remained focused; a pull of the trigger vaporized the clone.

* * *

 

Cracking his eyes open with a groan, Danny sat up and assessed the damage to himself. Nothing was broken yet, though one of his ribs felt like it was about to crack. A flash of white light and he was Phantom once more, his hood appearing over his shoulders and head when he summoned up his ice armor. "How could this have happened?"

"What in the devil  _ is _ happening?" A familiar and unwelcome voice questioned as the rubble to Danny's left shifted and was pushed over. A bruised looking Vlad dusted off his suit and transformed once again, the armor he had worn into battle right where it had been and looking partially repaired. "There are few spirits out there strong enough to knock us both out at once, fewer who have any interest in the Earth. Who are we dealing with, Daniel?"

"I was planning on telling you about him today." Blades rose from Phantom's gauntlets and he rose into the air slowly. "Right now I need to call a temporary truce to deal with that monstrosity, and then we'll get back to killing each other." Holding out a hand wreathed in blue flames, Phantom stared at his enemy. "Do we have a Deal?"

"That we do," crimson flames rose to Plasmius' hand as he clasped it around the younger's and the two energies mixed together. An idea ran through their heads at once and they flung the collective power at the spirit attacking everyone.

Dan snarled and hissed, what felt like an electrical burn lighting his back up with pain. Turning to the source of the attack, he was clocked in the face by an armored fist. His response was a kick to Plasmius' chest, hand raised to his left to blast Phantom out of the air. "Now that's something I never thought I'd see in my eternal lifetime. You two?" Blood red beams of energy flew from his hands and a blade made of ice cut through a green gas cloud. " _ And Danny boy is out for ectoplasm, what an interesting development. _ " The bloodthirsty spirit split in two and turned towards his enemies. "Show me how better you've gotten, Danny."

_ "I'll show you the way to hell, you monster!" _

* * *

 

One of the few upsides that Sam could see to this whole situation: Dan was sticking with them as his focus of destruction. Tucker had come to her side as well as Danny after she got hit by an ectoblast and she chided herself internally for not thinking to grab one of the smaller, portable, ghost shields that Tucker and Danny had made together. There had only been three prototypes, and Jazz and Tucker had theirs. Once this was all over, she'd have to get the burn treated ASAP.

In the moment, however, she was focused more on cutting and stabbing through the army of copies that Dan sent their way. Danny had sent one copy towards the woods and had another fighting with them, but even with his powers, her skills, and Tucker's tech, the three of them didn't have enough time to pull out a Fenton Thermos and try to suck the original in.

Danny cut through another copy and fired at one behind Sam whilst a fast-flying one impaled itself on her extended blade.  Tucker formed shields and Danny beat Dan away after he rammed into said shields, wishing that he had the specter deflector on him. His parents' inventions  had helped him in the past when fighting his future, but he didn't think they'd be doing the same thing twice.

Another concern of Danny's had been the strange energy that he had been sensing ever since those silver shields appeared. Following his sixth sense into the trees of the park, Danny formed a sword in his hand and thrust his blade into the back of a copy about to get the drop on the guys who had figured out his secret by spying on him. "What the absolute  _ hell _ are you two doing here?" Glad for his quick reflexes, Danny raised his ice blade and blocked a startled slash from George. "Wow, such a warm welcome."

"Says the guy using ice attacks." Rick flashed Danny a quick grin, trying to seem like he was keeping an entirely cool head in the middle of all this, but the silver fireball that he launched at a scampering squirrel said otherwise. "So, who is  _ that _ guy? A fan?"

"Ha ha," the halfa shook his head and glared up at the sky where Plasmius and Dan were exchanging blows, blades, and blasts in equal quantities and noted that Plasmius was holding his own, before turning back to the twins. "I take it you were responsible for putting out the trees and blocking when I needed the support?" A proud smile stretched on George's face, even as he held his brother up.

"Yeah, Rick has a way with words and it looks like ectoplasm is malleable when it comes to the mind." Letting out a huff, he closed his eyes and concentrated, a tree branch shaking rapidly above Danny's head until leaves fell onto the copy. "And I can do that a lot better in this environment."

"Yeah, well, I think I'll be taking you guys away from the battle now." Rick made a sound of protest and George opened his mouth to put that to words but Danny held out a hand to stop them, no room for argument in his green and blue eyes. "Neither of you has much experience in a firefight like this, Rick looks like he's about to fall over with the next gentle breeze and we don't know if George can make shields the same way. You're leaving, and I'm making sure you get out safe."  Grabbing onto both freshmen at once, Danny’s sixth sense roared in his ears, his vision warped itself and he swore never to touch a pair of psychics like that again.

* * *

 

Elle found the rush of being dragged along by the infimap to a portal exhilarating.  The elated feeling faded once she flew through the portal.  Upon entering the scene of battle, she almost wished that she hadn't come.  Danny, Sam and Tucker were surrounded by a swarm of what looked like the same ghost, duplicating himself every time one of the hunters got a good hit on him, Vlad and Valerie were in the sky and fighting the very same ghost - Vlad with a sword and flames, and Valerie with all of her weapons Elle had seen before, and a few she hadn't. If she was judging this sixth sense thing properly, there were even a couple more ghosts in the woods that a copy of Danny was with.

Not wanting to find out if the sword would hurt her for trying to wield it in battle, Elle turned invisible and flew straight for the trio of teens, firing off a helpful shot to get through. "Danny, I brought the weapon from Frostbite! Take it!" Kicking another evil ghost copy, she held out the Anriothadh and retreated into the ground as soon as the humming weapon was in his hand, narrowly avoiding a swipe of talons made from maroon ectoplasm. When she rose up a yard or so away, the ghost girl had an ectoblast ready. "¿Qué diablos está pasando? I knew I'd be entering a fight but I didn't know you guys had ordered a war zone!"

" _ Get out of here, Elle! _ " Danny made another copy, straining how far he could stretch himself, and pulled his sister out of the way of an ectoblast, forming a shield around them. " **_Now_ ** _ , this is too big a battle and I don't want you getting hurt!" _

To Danny's slight surprise, Elle turned invisible and dove into the ground once again, but instead of fleeing the battle like her brother had said, she joined up with his copy in the wooded area of the park and became visible again. "Ok, I get having another perspective on the fight, but the three of you haven't moved since I got here. What's going on, and who are you?"

The copy's eyes were swallowed by sapphire light and the two humans' eyes were almost the same, irises nearly gone as gold and silver mixed together. Finally, Rick spoke, looking down at the book in his hands. "That spirit is possessed by a demon, and I think I have a way of helping out a bit more permanently."

"Which one is being possessed?" Danny's eyes flicked from Dan to Vlad and back, terrified and awed at the same time. He and the twins were seeing the world as though a lens made of mist were placed over their eyes. Sam, Tuck, and Valerie were all human shapes made of gold and silver, while Elle and the original Danny were green tinged with silvery light. What held Danny's focus on Plasmius and Dan were the shapes pulsing within their outlines like parasites. Things darker than any black the teens had seen, even when staring up at the vast emptiness of space.  At least space was filled with the light of the stars.

The darkness was wrapped around something white and red respectively, specks of light shining through for seconds at a time before being swallowed up by the void. George reached out and curled his fingers in the air, faint golden light wrapping around both Plasmius and Dan and slowing them both for a moment. "I'd say it's both of them. Explains why the sky is turning red when one blocks the other."

"I found it, the exorcism ritual! One thing we need is already in Georgy's hands." He gestured to the knife that was now shining crimson in their eyes. "But to do this we'll need to either lure them into a circle and bind them there-"

"Or draw the circle over the entire park while they fight," George released his grip, a burning sensation reaching his hand. "But first we need to stab the dude with the flaming hair in the heart with this athame before we begin the ritual." glancing over, he handed the knife to Elle, and she quirked a brow at the three of them.

"Ok, so you're experiencing some weird psychic shit, Vlad and that other dude up there attacking everybody are possessed by demons and you want me to go stab the dude that's giving Vlad a run for his money in the core with a knife." Flipping the blade over the ghost girl counted on her fingers. "Did I miss anything?"

" _ The part where you get somewhere safe, and I handle the fight against the evil flaming haired ghost that's rocking our family insignia. _ " The elder halfa attempted to split in two once again, but in the middle of this fight, he was spread too far. " _ I think that the whole, trap circle idea is the best one to go with. Think you can manage to bind them after I push them to the spot guys?" _

"Possibly, but we'll need her help, Danny." George flinched away from the spectral hero’s glare. "Look, I dunno who this is to you, why she's wearing your symbol or where the hell she came from, but she seems to be a good chance of dealing with all of this, and if she helps the way we're thinking, she doesn't even have to be in much danger."

"Yeah Danny, there's this thing I can use called  _ invisibility _ ." Elle glared at her brother and floated back, scanning the battlefield that the park had become. "I'll just join you, Sam and Tuck instead of going too high in the air. That way, I can help out without being noticed, get back and help them with their ritual."

"We have everything we need for it in our bag too," George shook his backpack gently, the noise proving that there was indeed something in there. "But with you occupied in the fight and us without ectoblasts, we need someone to go in and do this."

If they had the time, Danny would have debated against it until the ghost girl left, a fight against Dan was too dangerous to have her in. But they didn't have any time, and Clockwork didn't seem likely to be interfering anytime soon. Letting out a growl-like huff, the prince nodded and grabbed the boys. " _ Fine, go. Be stealthy, be quick, and find us right after. _ " Taking to the air, he headed deeper into the woods, having a good place to set up their little trap.

Elle faded from the visible spectrum and zoomed towards her brother and his friends, knife clutched tightly in hand. She wasn't going to fail in this fight.

* * *

 

Vlad's blade clashed against energy so dense he could feel its heat even through his gauntlets and heat resistant skin. Twin rays of red hot energy collided with each other in the small space between them, and the halfa had to raise his knee up to the spirit's gut to keep his head on his shoulders. " _ Who the bloody hell are you? _ " That symbol on the wretched ghoul's chest couldn't have been a coincidence. " _ What have you to do with Daniel? _ "

"He hasn't told you, has he?" Dan vanished, reappearing behind Vlad and raking his claws against mystic metal. "That's hilarious, you'd think that something like that story would be spread to all involved." Ducking a kick from a Plasmius duplicate behind him, the flaming-haired monster loosed a fireball at the halfa, laughing to himself when it was caught.

" _ Told me what, you mongrel? _ " The embers in his hand grew a brighter red, similar fire coating his sword once again. Throwing the fireball, he disappeared in a cloud of red smoke.

"Who I am, what I am, what happens to you two in the future," Dan shrugged and waved away the fireball, ducking a swing from Vlad's sword when he appeared to his left. "That he had a little adventure with time travel."

Plasmius scoffed, blocking a glowing claw with a mirror-like shield, another of him grabbing onto the Phantom imposter. " _ Now why do I doubt that? If you're from the future then how would you be here? _ "

"I was never taken back to my time; pretty sure everyone there is dead anyways." Disconnecting his lower and upper halves, Dan swung his foot into Vlad's face while trying to burn a hole through the shield in front of him. "It was fun to do, that genocide."

"Genocide?" Vlad sneered in repulsion, appeared over Dan's head and roaring out a torrent of flame. When his own fire was met with the other's, the armor-clad halfa vanished from sight but was blasted away when he got with an inch of cutting this damned annoyance's head off.

"Don't sound so disgusted, Vladdy~" The demented spirit practically sang as he released a wave of energy in every direction. "After all, half of me is half of  _ you _ ." He was a cloud of green mist once again, flowing all around his pompous opponent, laughter ringing in the air as fire was raised a threat to him.

_ "What nonsense are you spewing?" _

* * *

 

Even with her martial arts training and several months worth of ghost hunting up her sleeve - hell, even the new drones she had just made - Valerie had to admit that she was a bit in over her head in this battle. Her suit was keeping the ghoul from overshadowing her while she dealt with a clone, thankfully, but he was fast, strong, and seemed to be about as smart as Vlad tactically speaking. He dodged half of the bigger shots she fired, charged through the rapid rays from her board and phased through all of her missiles, which then locked onto Plasmius. As much as she would love to see him taken down, Vlad was still half human, and she couldn't let a human die on her watch.

"Honestly, Val, half a year of experience - probably more - and you're still this easy to deal with?" Dan sneered and slammed his fist into her shield. "I must say, I'm disappointed. Though I suppose knowing how good you could be with ten years of practice would make this less exciting." A lucky shot got in from her drones and he retaliated with maroon fire.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Swerving around the fireballs and priming a different kind of grenade, the Huntress let her curiosity and aggravation get the better of her. "Ten years from now is ten years from now, you'd have to be a time traveler to know how good I am then!" When the ghost opened his fanged mouth to answer, she tossed the grenade and crossed her fingers as he turned into green mist. Sparks of electricity flew from the grenade as it passed through him and elicited a roar of pain and anger. "What you should be focusing on is how good I am now since you'll be getting your ass kicked at the same time." While he was stunned by the shock grenade, Val got in close and shoved the taser attached to her suit into the ghost's resolidifying form, raising the amperage to do more damage.

* * *

 

Dan's fangs pierced into Sam's leg as she stabbed him directly in the core.  How did the three of them know where the damn thing was? The warped ghost wondered.  A staff to the face nearly took his head off, the blast of energy following having finished the job. Danny was throwing kicks and punches like a legitimately trained fighter, and that was particularly irritating. When had he become so skilled?  "Tell me, Danny boy, how did you get so good?"

_ "Same way I got so good with everything: practice!" _ Three Phantom's hit Dan at once; a blast of blue energy about as big as Dan himself, about a million shards of ice, and a chain made of ectoplasm with an electric charge to make him scream. " _ Why won't you  _ **_die_ ** _? _ " Sam's SoulShredder and Phantom's Anriothadh pierced the duplicate chest and a pile of goop stained the grass.

"Come now, Danny boy," another copy of the damnable evil spirit appeared behind Tucker and lobbed a fireball at him.  The technogeek spun on instinct, his portable ghost shield raised just in time to save his life.  Dan snapped his fingers in disappointment. "Why resist the future so damn much?"

* * *

 

" _ Why the hell do you think, you monster? _ " Phantom's twin gauntlet blades glanced off of a shield that barely shook from the force of it, but his foot still connected with his evil future's face. " _ I refuse to turn into you! I promised! _ "

"You promised? Such Integrity," Dan sneered and laughed, throwing spears of energy in the direction of his younger self. "You promised your dying family that you'd stay a good boy, stick to the side of Justice, and yet I'm still here." He dodged a kick to the head and hissed as a blast left a burn on his cheek, the oddly sweet scent of burning ectoplasm filling the air between them that sparked like static. "I still exist! That means you-" He stopped, staring with bemusement at the frozen block of ice Danny had turned his arm into.

" _ Vlad was never the best scientist, was he? _ " Danny formed a veritable whip of energy, green and blue pulsating along the tendril of ectoplasm as he swung it at Dan, missing his ankle by centimeters but still laughing. " _ I just remembered something that Plasmius' influence most likely wiped from your memory."  _ He ducked a swipe of talons and reached into the cloud of smoke that formed around him, power coursing through his fingertips and shocking the cloud back into Dan, who then shot him down from behind.

"What are you rambling about, pipsqueak?"

" _ You aren't me _ ."

* * *

 

"Don't tell me you haven't ever wondered what happens when you remove the human element from the halfa equation?" Pillars of energy collided and pushed against each other as the halfa and spirit bantered.

" _ The halfa in question would become harder and easier to kill, _ " Vlad snarled, an air of haughtiness still obvious in his voice. " _ What do I care? _ "

"It would also free Plasmius of Masters' precious conscious, that last thread of human Integrity that remains." growing bored with the clash of energy, Dan appeared behind Vlad and blasted away a chunk of the armor on his arm, jumping back just in time to avoid getting cut in half. "And Phantom of half of his emotional stability - if say all of his friends and family had died in a fiery explosion."

Vlad swung furiously, waves of flaming plasma cutting through the air at the thought. " _ You… you're overshadowing the boy?! _ " He grunted as a blast left a dent in his chest plate and sent him backward.

"Not exactly, though that was the original idea.  Think more of an unnatural fusion," the evil spirit cackled in malicious glee at the expression of disgusted rage on Vlad's face.  "You're just jealous that I thought of it first."

* * *

 

" _ Don't remember all the mishaps Drs. Jack and Maddie Fenton had in attempting to open a vortex to another dimension? _ " Danny ducked a swing, shot a foot out and grinned maliciously when it connected with a tender spot. " _ Britain world, Zamobora, the other three worlds that we got sucked into?" _ He blocked a spear of energy and formed his tail, swerving around fireballs and waves of dark red power. " _ You don't even have ice powers." _

"And what do I care about that?" The evil spirit dodged the swing of a sword, getting slapped in the face with his younger self's tail. A stream of fire flew from his mouth and melted the lower half of Danny's armor. "It's an irrelevant part of my past."

" _ Not learning from your past is what did you in last time, wasn't it? _ " Danny cut through a wave of energy and swung up to remove his evil other self's arm. " _ We broke the barriers of both Space and Time, and proved the many worlds theory ages ago." _ Snow began to fall as he threw disks of energy, which exploded just after Dan dodged them. " _ Your timeline and this timeline are two different ones. You still exist because Clockwork hasn't destroyed the timeline you originate from. _ " He wove his body around his other self, resolutely ignoring the way his tongue appeared to be forked when he hissed in Dan's ear. " **_And because I haven't killed you yet!_ ** " Spikes of ice shot out from all over his body, piercing the duplicate and turning him to mist.

* * *

 

Noting yet another copy popping - one electrocuted to death, two stabbed, one blasted - Dan grew bored of fighting this five on one battle. Rising above the eldest halfa, he left another copy to deal with Plasmius. Another grabbed the vampiric specter's duplicate hidden to observe the fight from above and tore it in twine, one of Danny’s copies getting blasted into the ground until he was nothing more than goo. "Ya know, I think this park is getting noisy. You know what they say: the best way to get silence is to be louder than everyone else." A familiar ectosignature raced into the sky to meet him, and his copies were vaporized, but it didn't matter.  Drawing in a breath of power, the energy in the air lurching into his lungs and his core, Dan decided that he wouldn't be holding back this time.  _ He _ wouldn't be able to hold him back, not anymore.

Danny shot five feet past Plasmius, shining sword in hand, and breathed just as deeply, aura flaring somehow brighter than mere minutes ago. Plasmius swore under his breath - a real swear- and focused on his sword, blazing fire wrapping around the blade. The atmosphere in the park stilled, the only thing disturbing it was the approach of the Fenton GAV. Valerie charged her weapons, Tucker scanned the area and confirmed that Dan had reverted back to being only him in the sky, and Sam took aim as her friend readied his shield.  Silence hung, the calm between lightning and thunder. One thought broke through Tucker's terrified mind.

_ Glass makers are about to get quite a business boom from Amity Park. _

* * *

 

Elle had been quick and stealthy, just as promised. She flew in, shoved the knife into the core of a copy that had just dodged Danny's new sword, and flew back towards the ectosignature of the duplicate of Danny.  As she made it back to the twins and her brother, the copy turned into a silhouette of bright blue light and flew off as a wisp towards the original. Maroon, Crimson, and blazing azure painted the sky. Touching down next to the boys, Elle let out a sigh and returned to the visible spectrum. "I'd like to get this little ritual started, please? What else do you need besides this knife?"

"Gah—" Rick grasped his chest with one hand, "Sudden appearances aren't good for my heart." Calming down he added.  "We were about to ask Danny to help us carve these sigils into the ground with his ghost rays," Rick showed her the page.  "Think you can manage to help us do this if you get a bird's eye view?"

"Too small a circle and it'll be nearly impossible for us to get the two of them in it long enough to hold them there." George was going over the words of the binding spell in his head since Rick had a demon or two to push out of spirits. "If we can ring this clearing with the right circle,"

"We'll be able to catch them once Danny pushes them this way." Elle nodded and floated just above the tops of the nearest trees, holding the book that Rick had shown her in one hand and aiming as carefully as possible with the other. The outer circle itself was easy enough to carve into the ground, before  _ that sound _ met her ears.

Looking up to the sky, ears covered in an attempt to protect her sensitive eardrums, Elle marveled at the sight before her. Between the rough ten yards of air separating the halfas and the possessed ghost, waves of red and black erupted from Dan's mouth, met by icy cold wind, snow and protective fury from Danny, Plasmius swinging his sword in an arc and adding swirling crimson flames like a volcano erupting in the arctic. Mixing in with the Wails was the sound of glass breaking. Rick's glasses, as well as every window in Amity Park, cracked and shattered as the sonic attacks resonated off of each other.

Rick and George fell to the ground, Jack slammed the brakes and crashed into a lamppost, Valerie was flung from the sky and Tucker thanked his lucky stars that the ectoplasmic base of the sound made his shield the best thing for muffling it. Now it simply sounded like natural thunder over their heads, while an earthquake challenged the sound above.

Elle could see her brother's strength waning fast, his strongest power too much to keep up for more than a few seconds. At least unaided. Leaving the circle unfinished for the moment, Elle flew as fast as she could through the bombardment of sound and stopped when she was a meter away, unable to get any closer. Electricity sparked between the two halfas before her, flames mixing in with each wave of power from Danny, amplifying the Wail and keeping it sustained. It was a violent joining of power, one that wouldn't last very long. Though she could hardly hear herself think, the ghost girl thanked Mokuto for the lesson he was giving her when all of this started.

Almost indistinguishable from the air around her, Elle's aura flared up, forest green and pulsating with energy. The ghost girl held out her hand towards her brother, and the other towards the sky. Green light reached out and mixed with blue, energy branching from her body into the air like roots in a tree . Closing her eyes to concentrate, Elle pulled the energy from the air into herself and passed it along to her brother, doing her best to sustain his power until the other ghost rocking their insignia stopped.

Danny felt strength flow back into him. At first, it wasn't enough, his Wail weakened and quieted even if only slightly. A surge of power, the source of which he wasn't sure, and the energy that he could only guess Elle was giving him grew to be just enough to keep him going. He could feel each wave of ice and snow mixing with fire and rage as it collided with corrupted hatred and emptiness. As much as he hated to admit it, without Plasmius there, he would have been forced back already. But now, Dan was starting to slow down, the power he had worked so long to master finally giving out on him.

The shaking slowed, the cracks in the ground stopped growing and Valerie righted herself before digging her own grave in the ground below. Checking all of her equipment, Valerie took aim at the trio - now quartet - of ghosts in the sky. They were still going at it, Plasmius, Phantom, and that other ghost, but all three of them seemed to be weakening. Danielle was reaching out to Phantom and the readings on the ghost girl showed a spike in energy, so she had to be doing something to her cousin. Valerie focused her sights on the flaming haired ghoul above them, finding it a bit difficult through all of the noise around her, and charged up her cannons, weapon forming in her arm from a flash of red light.

She attempted to fire but waves of sound energy launched from both directions disrupted her attack.  There was no quick way around them all, but if she wanted an advantage, Val would need to get higher. Turning around, she flew away from the sound of devilish thunder and then up.

Plasmius' flames ceased, the halfa needing a moment to breathe in some of the energy around them. He had seen this attack before, when Daniel used it, but never to such a degree. Certain things were frightening not because of how strong they were, but how far they could reach, and this was a terrifying power. Had they allowed this to hit Amity Park it would have consumed the town, leaving nothing but rubble. Even now, as he regained his strength, Plasmius could see that the other ghost was winning in this bout of power without his aid. The half ghost sighed and took in another deep breath. He could only hope that his pawn would get to a better vantage point before he and the boy ran out of power, for all their sakes.

* * *

 

When the sound stopped, Rick's ears still rang. He tried his best to will it away. Cracks forked and shattered the ground all around them, excluding the ground beneath their feet and where that Phantom girl had burned in the circle. A bright green light filled their vision and the ghost girl hurried back to finish the circle.  Rick grabbed his brother and shook him a bit. "George?" No response, his voice muffled to his own ears.  He shook again, more urgently this time. "George wake up!"

The younger twin groaned and stirred, the movement inspiring a sigh of pure relief from his brother who continued to urge him awake. "Ricky lemme sleep… head hurts…" He blinked open his eyes, hand held to his pounding skull, and looked around in confusion. "What happened?"

It took a moment for the bespectacled teen to interpret just what his brother had said thanks to the ringing, but he pointed to the sky when he did, removing his now useless glasses. "Danny and that vampire dude were having a screaming contest with the flaming haired dude." Following his own finger, he saw another mini phantom in the sky floating around Danny and launching a barrage of attacks at the possessed spirit nearing the ground. The Red Huntress blazed a trail through the sky, bazooka firing off shot after shot, mostly hitting her mark.

"Ok, so she makes copies too, we should never get Danny to yell at us, and the ground is not safe to stand on, outside of a meter radius of that circle," George muttered to himself and shakily rose to his feet, letting his brother help him when he stumbled on nothing. "This is scary Ricky."

"I know George, but we gotta get through it. We have an exorcism to do." Rick reached into his brother's back pocket and pulled something the boxer swore never to mock George for carrying ever again. "Part of that is putting down salt lines to keep the demons in when we purge them so that they can't escape before we banish them back to their world." The golden eyed teen nodded and pulled out another sizable pack of salt from his other back pocket and the two split up, laying down a ring of salt around the outer circle Elle was drawing.

The duplicate was extra careful with the placement of the sigils between the outer and inner circles, thankful for the steady hands that she inherited from Danny. Once those were done, the really difficult part came. Her form flickered as the original formed a shield that was cracked by an ectoblast, and she nearly messed up on the sigil she was finishing. "Whoever decided that drawing a sun and moon with these symbols was necessary needs a kick to the shin," she grumbled indignantly.

* * *

 

Dan split in four, this time, ignoring Sam and Tucker for the moment and focusing on the aerial combatants. Valerie's suit adapted as she fought, weapons changing from the general mid-level ghost fight variety to homing missiles locked onto his ectosignature. Electric grenades, and whirling blades of death followed him around and narrowly avoided Danny as though programmed not to hit him.  Once he had dealt with those nuisances by hitting the centers, the evil specter found himself snarling in pain as electrified ectoplasm struck his back from the ground. Turning to glare, he saw that the GAV had arrived, and though the windows were cracked, the Fentons were undeterred in their hunt.

Danny was attempting to judge just which Dans were duplicates and which one was the original so that he could pierce the warped spirit’s core with the Anriothadh, which was pulsating with his energy and adding to it somehow. He knew, Dan was most likely being overshadowed - possessed by Plasmius and whatever corrupt thing that tainted the older halfa's ghost half.  It didn't excuse all the horrible things that he had done. A whole world - two worlds - ravaged and destroyed, razed of all life save one city and some straggling ghosts. Ember's vocal cords snapped, Johnny put in a wheelchair, he didn't even see Wulf in that world, so he had no idea if the lupine ghost was even still alive. Boxlunch had to grow up in a world with  _ that _ running rampant and forcing her father to grow stronger just to keep her safe.

Dan was a threat to the worlds, and while he was willing to give Vlad a chance, the elder halfa's committed crimes that Danny knew of were less in quantity and severity - not counting Fright - to Dan's. If the circle was finished fast enough, he'd use the exorcism, but he was determined to be rid of this demon now and forever.

Elle spared a half second of attention to give Danny a worried look when he sliced through the core of the duplicate in front of him and he swore in a language that he didn't even recognize himself. She wrapped threads of ectoplasmic webbing around the copy in front of her and he ran it through as well, growling in frustration when he saw that it was also _ just a copy _ . The light in her eyes grew brighter and the ghost girl nodded, signaling that the circle was about ready.

Danny switched his Fenton Phone to the frequency Tuck had been using earlier, tuning into Val's com system. " _ Valerie, I'm using a pair of Fenton Phones and I have a plan. _ " He spoke softly, launching shards of ice in the direction of Plasmius and Dan. " _ We can deal with both Plasmius and Dan in one swoop if we go with this plan. The Pate twins are psychic and magic it turns out - you're wearing a supernaturally created suit of ghost hunting technology that's merged with your being, nothing is impossible. Follow our lead, I'll deal with Dan, you and Elle push Plasmius towards the woods. _ " A barely audible affirmative rang through the FentonPhones and Val shoved a hunting knife through the core of a copy as it turned to deflect the ice coming from Danny. Several things happened in such a blur in the moment after that even the hero with a year and a half of experience in battle had a hard time keeping up with it all.

Jack and Maddie fired off simultaneous shots, one dodged and the other hitting its mark, stunning Dan long enough for Tucker's recharged gauntlet to push him up into the sky, toward the woods. The shot that missed Dan - from Jack of course - collided with Plasmius' face, opening him up long enough for Valerie to hit him with twin missiles from her board, which still had a lock on him. Elle grabbed Plasmius with another web of ectoplasm and swung him in the direction of the trees, Red Huntress hot on his cape, and chased after him.  Danny rose up, grabbed Dan's foot, and shocked him as hard as he could, adding cold energy to the charge.

Throwing the evil spirit towards the trap, Danny formed three copies, two of them invisible, and hammered him with a barrage of fireballs, ice shards, and energy blasts. Dan tried branching off a copy but before the two could fully separate Danny's duplicate impaled it. Another Phantom copy, invisible, slammed his fist into the older spirit.

Rick and George were already chanting, the circle surrounded on all sides by something white and powdery, and the ectoplasm in the air felt thicker there. A shot from Valerie slammed Plasmius into the ground, though the circle went undamaged. A missile from the sled and a second, albeit quieter, wail from Danny's duplicate, and Dan was pushed in the same spot in the air. Elle wrapped her webs around his neck, waist, and chest, yanking down on him while Sam fired a shot to Plasmius' face, and Tucker discharged a lightning-like blast at the armored halfa.

Danny swooped down and pinned both Dan and Plasmius to the ground, drawing upon the power of his ice core as much as possible and freezing the pair to the ground while they were dazed by the assault. " _ It's amazing what some training can do after only a few months, isn't it? Daniel James Phantom and Vlad Damien Plasmius, as King of Spirits, I judge you both guilty of murder and in the case of Dan, attempted genocide. _ " The salt line glowed golden and completed its circle around the corrupted spirits as Danny and Elle floated back, the athame stabbed into the outer ring of the circle.

Silver light wrapped around Dan and Plasmius, darkness writhing out like flames. Dan's form flickered as George took up the chant and gold mixed with silver, holding the two down even as the ice shattered and web melted. No one was quite sure what was being said, the battle taking its toll on their concentration skills since the main threats were contained.

Plasmius and Dan both writhed in agony and with one final scream that sent chills down everyone's spines, something shadowy rose from their mouths and eyes, the air becoming stagnant with a scent of acid. Above the now barely conscious spirits rose something that couldn't be described as black, which would imply color. There was only darkness and void, mixing together and taking on a disturbingly familiar shape.  Lines like magma crisscrossed around the figure starting from the center of its chest until they covered the whole of its body. Pits of lava formed at the top of its head, glaring at everything around it, alabaster fangs bared in a snarl.

" **You children toy with forces beyond your comprehension.** " It spoke with a voice that both was and was not Vlad's. There was something alien about the sound coming from its mouth, a reverberation unlike sound, nameless to all human tongues.  " **Halt your foolishness and I shall make your deaths quick.** "  It was of course at this moment that Jack and Maddie charged into the clearing, weapons blazing and froze at the sight before them. Plasmius - for what else could it be that rose from both Vlad and Dan, that poisoned their very souls - sneered in their direction, a possessive gleam in his eyes that made even the senior ghost hunter shiver when he looked at Maddie, and a murderous glow that had Jack on edge. " **Ah, Madeline and Jackson, how good it is to see you again.  This time, I shall not be stopped by some petulant children** !" A hand reached out and a roar of pain rang throughout the woods housed by the park, unnatural to any of this realm of the living or even that of spirit.  " **I shall not be denied! Maddie** **_shall_ ** **be mine, as will the entrails of your putrid oaf body, Jack!  A mere condiment cannot hold me for long!** "

"A demon…" Jack never thought he'd see one again after defeating Azazel's minions and the demon king himself back in New Mexico, a set of nights that had instilled a fear of things that went bump in the night. "What is a  _ demon _ doing in Amity Park?"

"Who summoned you, monster?" Maddie leveled her bazooka directly at Plasmius, ignoring the ghosts for now. This  _ thing _ was more dangerous than anything that had ever come to their city. "It couldn't have been through the ghost portal or else we would have known a lot sooner."

" **Why Madeline, don't you know it's rude to aim weapons at someone while they're talking?** " Plasmius paid no mind to the twins, who had resumed their chanting as soon as the Fentons came onto the scene. Hell, one had just knocked out the other, continuing the incantation on his own, though if the mistake's rushing to his aid was any indicator, everyone else thought he had fainted. The boy couldn't possibly have enough power to banish him from the mortal realm. " **If you really must know, I arrived here both through time travel and through these two vessels at my feet. You would know them - if you ever listened to a spirit when they spoke - as Dan Phantom, and Vlad Plasmius. I suppose you could say that I'm what made them tick.** " Fire burned at the edge of the circle holding him, golden light shining where it met salt. " **These fool children thought that they could get rid of me by removing me from these fools.** " A sword made of darkness lit aflame and energy crackled and arced all over the confines of the clearing when the blade met the binding spell. " **But you see, even a witch and a psychic are no match for my power, especially now that I am no longer restrained by their pathetic-** " a stab to the ground, fire racing along the lines and earning a scream from Rick mid-sentence, but he kept going, red and black being overtaken by silvery white. "- **Morality. Now, I am free to take what I want, and take it I shall.** "

Valerie aimed her cannon at Plasmius, growling internally as the lines of glowing circuitry on her suit lit up with her rage. "Are you telling me that you're the reason for Vlad manipulating me, sending me after an innocent boy and a little girl who hadn't done anything wrong? You're the reason I'm stuck where I am now?!" The barrier shimmered and flickered in response to her weaponry, and her orbiting drones shined with angry red light. "You tried to kill me and Phantom, melt down Danielle and all the other things that Plasmius has done that I don't even know about?"

" _ Valerie _ !" Danny held up a hand, frost spreading over her board and drones. " _ Don't shoot at him unless the barrier falls, it's only adding more to the workload and George isn't even conscious to sustain the binding spell and we don't know if the salt can hold him alone. _ " The Huntress growled again, sparks visible on her suit, but she retracted her weapons.

**"No no, do help me get out like the good little pawn you've been since I gave you your first set of ghost hunting equipment.** " Plasmius' cackle was cut off by a groan of pain as the light from the circle wrapped around him and burned against his skin, golden blood trailing down his arms and legs like rivers. " **Boy, do you really think that you can banish me? I am a force beyond this world and the world of ghosts and spirits, something the earth hasn't seen for hundreds of years and you are not but a child!** " The gold light dimmed and Plasmius' struggles to break free became more desperate as Rick spoke. Shadows coalesced in the air above the trees and the demon's cape rose up towards them.

The barrier shattered, a taloned hand reached out and weapons fired all at once, and Rick got out his last three words. "Ne  _ Kaj  _ **_For!_ ** "  Everyone was flung back from the circle except for Rick. A scream of vengeful damnation rent the air. Darkness clawed from the sky and entangled Plasmius in an abyss dotted with streaks of white and gold, just as his taloned hand left two lines of red on the boxer's face, and dragged him into the world of demons.

* * *

 

Danny opened his eyes to a scene that didn't look like a victory. Rick was on the ground, holding his face and groaning in pain, George was still unconscious, flung into a tree next to Elle by the last wave of energy. Sam and Tucker were on top of each other and panting heavily, the Fentons were in a similar predicament but picking themselves up about as quickly as he was. Looking around, he noticed Val had fallen into a bunch of tree branches that were being cut away. There was no Plasmius demon anymore, but darkness hovered bare meters before them, pulling in the ectoplasm in the air.

Right below it two glowing figures finally drew the prince's eyes. Vlad's hair was no longer in horns, but now obeyed the laws of gravity like in his human form, though his skin was still blue and his aura just as white as it usually was. There was little change, which was both relieving and disturbing.

Dan was another story.

His hair was a blaze of white flames, but his ears were more rounded and his fangs gone. His skin was as tan as someone who flew above the clouds as regularly as Danny did, and even his wardrobe was different. White pants, a black short sleeve shirt with blazing DP in the center, white gloves and black boots with a purple belt. What looked like silver bracers adorned his arms from his wrists to his elbows. All in all, he looked like a regular guy with flaming hair that liked a certain part of his Halloween costume. It was almost unsettling how  _ normal  _ he looked without the influence of Plasmius in him.

Looking up, Danny got to checking over Elle, who had just risen to her feet and was looking over George at the moment. "How is he?" There was no otherworldly echo to his voice, not even to the level standardly heard when a ghost was speaking. He barely had enough energy to float, even with the Anriothadh.

Elle looked up with dull green eyes and sighed. "He'll be fine, he's just out cold. I'm a bit more worried about Rick right now." The stress in her tone made the sarcasm fall flat as they both went over to Rick. "Hey, Rick, you did good man. You did an exorcism, even did half of it by yourself, and that's nothing to spit at. I know that hurts like a bitch," the Fentons gave disapproving glares, as did Valerie through her visor, but no one else could be brought to care. "But you need to move your hands. I'm a healer, I can help, but only if I can get to the injury. Keep your eyes closed and move your hands."

When he hesitated to do as asked and tensed at the ghost girl's touch, Danny leaned on the Anriothadh and muttered to the freshman, mustering as much authority as humanly possible. "Richard Pate, close your eyes and move your hands. You contributed, you fixed things, and you saved the day. Now let us help you." With the hero's orders the pain and desire to have it go away won and Rick lowered his hands to his sides.

There were two gashes on his face, both mere centimeters away from his eyes and bleeding. Danny pulled off the fabric of his turtleneck, which had remained the way it was to his dismay, and gently dabbed away the blood, blowing a slight cool breeze over his face and almost regretting it when white sparks twinkled into existence around his torso. "I can't do anymore Elle, I'm almost completely out of power."

"That's ok, I've still got enough for this." There wasn't much ectoplasm left in the air, which was disturbing but not the current problem. Ignoring the breeze rising upward over her skin instead of following a natural current, she focused on what energy she could feel. What little inside of Rick that could be spared, she mixed with what was in the atmosphere and her own power, hands held over his face glowing softly. Slowly, the injury stopped bleeding.

Turning to his parents and friends, Danny was mildly surprised that he wasn't being shot at right now. He was vulnerable and weakened from battle, guarding his sister and probably would have been taken down, if not out, by a single shot from those ectobazookas. Yet, there he was, no more harmed than the battle with Dan and Plasmius had left him. "Is everyone ok?" he managed to ask, gaze flicking to Vlad and Dan every now and then, where everyone else's focus seemed to be.

Tucker and Sam nodded and strode over to his side, checking him over as they knew he neglected to do. Valerie looked between the trio and the Fentons, unsure of what to do now, but tense, and the Fentons glanced to each other. Finally, before Val went mad from the silence, they looked to Danny and surprised him further. "We're not sure exactly how ok we are. We haven't seen a demon in years, and to see children handling the situation like you all did is shocking."

"Not just because of how well Sam, Tucker and Red handled it," Jack frowned in Rick and Elle's direction, also glancing over at George. "But also because two obvious newbies got involved and got hurt. This was dangerous, about as dangerous as when that Pariah Dark came to town and sucked us into the Ghost Zone. I don't like that you kids were dealing with all of this, even with the Phantoms here."

"However," Maddie's scolding tone softened with something akin to pride as she looked at Sam and Tucker. "We're proud that you've discovered a way to get rid of demons that we likely wouldn't have. All of our tech is geared towards ectoplasmic entities, not whatever demons are made of, so they're less effective against demonic forces." Her expression and tone spoke of experience. Suddenly, the stories Danny had been told as a child of the time his parents dueled the demon king and his horde of minions as Azazel tried to get back to earth felt less like a bedtime story and more like something that had actually happened. "However, we still have a few pressing matters to deal with."

"What to do with those two, for instance?" Tuck jammed his thumb in the direction of the two fallen spirits. Vlad seemed to be coming to his senses and reaching up to rub away a migraine. "That's a pretty good question. Though, I'm a bit more concerned with theportal to another dimension above our heads." The gold and white flecked void had formed into a sphere and was now growing. "Either a portal or a black hole."  twin spheres of gold appeared in the void and were joined by the shapes of talons, fangs, and other appendages that bulged in all directions.

"If we can find that book we can figure out how to shut it. Rick can't have finished the spell if there's still a gateway to travel through." Sam immediately began looking around, while Danny tightened his grip on Anriothadh.

"That might have fallen into the cracks in the ground. We need to close it quick before something figures out how to get through." he ground his teeth, wishing he had enough power to reverse the process he used to open a portal. If he was back at full strength, he might have been able to try it, but not with how he was now. Even then, the ghostly equivalent of adrenaline was dropping quick and his limbs were feeling heavy. His aura had died so badly he looked more alive than dead and gravity weighted his limbs as a human's.

"Danny," Elle's voice cut through his musings, and he followed her gaze to his sword. "The idea that just came into both of our heads will likely kill you, permanently." He nodded and took the offered ectopistol from Sam, removing the energy capsule and downing it like a shot of soda. "Very likely. So, if there's anything you wanted to do before you died, now's the time to do it."

There were several seconds of silence as though clockwork had hit the timeout button on their staff.  Then, Danny surprised everyone by pulling first Tucker, then Sam into brisk yet meaningful kisses.  "I don't plan on dying, and you all know how stubborn I can be." Rising up to the swirling vortex of darkness, Danny channeled all the power he could spare into Anriothadh and shoved it into the center of the mystical black hole above them.

The world faded into white, black, gold, green and red.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tumblr.com/blog/summonedphantomau is where you can send your ideas for what should or could happen aferwards when Danny wakes up. yes, i have my own vague ideas, but i am also open to suggestion.


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